LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

RIVERSIDE 


MUNICIPAL   GOVERNMENT 
IN  CONTINENTAL  EUROPE 


BY 

ALBERT  SHAW 

AUTHOR  OF 
•MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  GREAT  BRITAIN' 


NEW  YORK 

THE  CENTURY  CO. 

1897 


Copyright,  1895,  by  THE  CENTURY  Co. 


THE  DE  VINNE  PRESS. 


PREFACE 

THE  many  readers  who  have  given  a  cordial  wel- 
come to  the  volume  on  "  Municipal  Government 
in  Great  Britain/' —  which  appeared  in  January  of  this 
year,  and  is  about  to  enter  a  third  edition, — will  need 
no  prefatory  explanation  of  the  author's  method  and 
point  of  view  in  this  companion  volume.  To  others 
it  may  be  well  to  explain  that  although  each  of  the  two 
volumes  is  complete  in  itself,  the  earlier  book  is  in 
some  sense  introductory  to  the  present  one;  while 
both  together  are  intended  to  serve  as  a  general  sketch 
of  the  history,  forms,  methods,  motives,  and  results 
of  municipal  administration  in  those  countries  of 
Europe  which  have  dealt  most  successfully  and  in- 
structively with  the  new  problems  arising  out  of  the 
conditions  of  life  in  cities.  The  rapid  expansion  of  the 
great  towns  is,  perhaps,  the  most  striking  social  phe- 
nomenon of  the  last  quarter  of  this  eventful  nine- 
teenth century.  The  term  Municipal  Government,  in 
the  United  States,  is  suggestive  of  attempts  to  eman- 
cipate our  great  towns  from  the  control  of  corrupt 
and  inefficient  men,  to  the  end  that  the  revenues  may 

v 


vi  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

be  honestly  collected  and  expended  and  public  work 
properly  performed,  and  that  the  police  power  may 
be  purified  from  its  taint  of  alliance  with  injustice 
and  crime.  But  in  Europe  the  honesty  and  the  gen- 
eral efficiency  of  municipal  government  are  not  seri- 
ously in  question  anywhere.  Municipal  government, 
from  Scotland  to  Hungary,  is  exalting  the  bacteriolo- 
gist and  the  sanitary  inspector,  fostering  the  kinder- 
garten and  the  technical  school,  and  inquiring  anx- 
iously about  the  housing  of  the  people.  I  have  tried 
to  explain  intelligibly  the  structure  and  working  of 
the  municipal  machinery,  but  I  have  considered  it  a 
no  less  essential  part  of  my  task  to  describe  the  trans- 
formation of  street-systems,  and  the  measures  by 
which  death-rates  have  been  reduced. 

To  some  critics  it  may  appear  that  I  have  ascribed 
undue  importance  to  Paris  as  a  type  and  an  influence ; 
yet  I  can  hardly  think  that  any  reader  will  fail  to 
agree  that  Paris  is  the  necessary  starting-point  for  a 
description  of  the  modern  regime  in  Continental 
cities.  In  the  preceding  volume  I  found  it  advanta- 
geous to  select  Glasgow  for  the  more  rounded  and 
elaborate  study  of  British  municipal  life  in  the  con- 
crete. In  my  own  inquiries  and  observations  as  an 
American  visitor,  I  had  discovered  that  to  know  well 
the  ways  and  works  of  the  Glasgow  municipality  was 
to  possess  standards  of  comparison  and  points  of 
view  which  afforded  the  best  possible  equipment  for 
the  further  examination  of  municipal  methods  and 
achievements,  whether  in  Edinburgh  and  Dundee,  in 
Belfast  and  Dublin,  or  in  Manchester,  Birmingham, 


PREFACE  vii 

and  Liverpool.  But  if  Glasgow  is  the  convenient 
threshold  to  a  comparative  knowledge  of  British 
municipal  affairs,  Paris  in  a  far  more  essential  way 
holds  the  key  to  an  intelligent  survey  of  municipal 
progress  on  the  Continent.  Whether  one  goes  to  the 
Low  Countries  and  Scandinavia,  to  Switzerland  and 
Italy,  or  to  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary,  he  finds 
evidences  on  all  hands  of  the  abounding  influence 
that  the  modern  Paris  has  exerted  upon  the  outward 
forms  of  European  cities.  And  some  study  of  the 
history  and  characteristics  of  administration  will 
soon  make  plain  to  him  the  remarkable  influence 
that  the  symmetrical  statutory  schemes  of  France 
have  exerted  upon  the  law-making  bodies  of  other 
countries. 

Thus  in  giving  so  large  a  space  to  Paris  and  the 
French  system, —  as  well,  let  me  add,  as  in  the  differ- 
ent method  employed  for  the  description  of  German 
city  government, —  there  is  nothing  accidental  either 
in  the  proportions  or  in  the  arrangement  of  the  pres- 
ent volume.  In  various  courses  of  lectures  upon  the 
administration  of  cities,  in  the  Johns  Hopkins  Uni- 
versity and  elsewhere,  I  have  sometimes  adopted  the 
plan  of  choosing  a  different  typical  city  for  discus- 
sion in  each  lecture,  and  at  other  times  have  arranged 
a  series  of  topics,  illustrating  each  topic  by  citations 
from  the  experience  of  numerous  cities.  Each  meth- 
od has  its  advantages;  and  while  the  first  is  for  many 
reasons  best  suited  to  the  purposes  of  this  book, 
I  have  found  it  feasible  in  considerable  measure  to 
combine  the  two.  I  have  not  attempted  to  supply  a 


viii          MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

cyclopedia  of  municipal  information,  and  doubtless 
many  things  will  be  found  lacking  that  would  to 
one  reader  or  another  seem  very  important.  Thus  I 
have  not  discussed  the  local  control  of  the  liquor 
traffic, —  except  for  allusions  to  the  new  Hamburg 
policy  which  compels  beer-sellers  to  wash  their  uten- 
sils and  scour  their  mugs !  But  largely  as  the  liquor 
question  enters  into  municipal  discussion  in  the 
United  States,  it  is  in  Europe  for  the  most  part  a 
national  or  general  rather  than  a  municipal  issue. 
I  have  omitted  it,  therefore,  not  because  I  failed  to 
appreciate  its  importance,  but  rather  because  it  is 
too  distinct  a  question  of  the  larger  public  policy  for 
incidental  treatment  in  a  volume  on  European  muni- 
cipal government. 

If  this  volume  had  been  meant  to  give  an  exhaus- 
tive rather  than  a  representative  account  of  munici- 
pal arrangements  in  Europe,  several  additional  chap- 
ters should  have  been  added.  The  Scandinavian 
capitals  possess  much  that  is  interesting  and  praise- 
worthy in  their  social  institutions ;  and  their  progress 
in  educational  and  sanitary  methods,  as  well  as  in 
public  works  and  general  aggrandizement,  is  cer- 
tainly worthy  to  be  noted.  Copenhagen  had  grown 
from  155,000  inhabitants  in  1860  to  about  350,000  in 
1895,  or  400,000  if  the  immediate  suburbs  are  in- 
cluded. Its  recent  improvement  in  health  conditions 
meanwhile  is  shown  by  a  steady  decline  of  the  death- 
rate,  which  from  a  much  higher  average  in  an  earlier 
period  had  fallen  to  24  per  1000  of  population  in 
1884,  and  to  18.7  in  1894.  The  city  of  Stockholm  in 


PREFACE  ix 

the  thirty  years  from  1865  to  1895  had  almost  exactly 
doubled  in  population,  having  increased  from  about 
130,000  to  more  than  260,000.  Christiania  meanwhile 
had  grown  at  an  amazing  rate.  In  1865  it  was  a 
town  of  57,000  people,  and  in  1895  it  had  about  171,- 
000  —  precisely  three  times  as  many  as  thirty  years 
before.  Stockholm's  death-rate  was  28.7  in  1877,  24.6 
in  1884,  and  only  18.3  in  1894.  Christiania's  in  1894 
was  18.8.  The  methods  of  municipal  administration 
in  the  Scandinavian  countries  resemble  in  some  re- 
spects those  of  Germany,  and  in  other  regards  show 
the  effects  of  French  influence,  while  embodying  va- 
rious features  peculiar  to  themselves.  But  apart 
from  the  three  capitals,  the  life  of  the  Scandinavian 
peoples  is  chiefly  rural. 

The  Swiss  towns  far  more  distinctly  than  the  Scan- 
dinavian reveal  the  twofold  influence  of  France  and 
Germany.  Each  Swiss  canton  has  its  own  system  of 
municipal  and  communal  organization.  The  French- 
speaking  cantons  incline  more  strongly  toward  the 
methods  that  prevail  in  the  provincial  districts  of 
France ;  while  the  towns  of  the  German-speaking 
cantons  —  though  not  organized  upon  the  Prussian 
model  —  show  more  of  the  German  spirit  and  scope 
of  action.  I  had  hoped  to  include  in  this  volume  a 
brief  chapter  on  recent  Swiss  experiments,  with  the 
view  of  presenting  some  account  of  proportional  rep- 
resentation, the  referendum,  and  other  innovations  as 
adopted  in  Switzerland.  But  while  proportional  rep- 
resentation has  been  gaining  ground  rapidly  since 
1890,  its  application  to  the  choice  of  municipal  coun- 


x  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

cils  has  been  too  recent  to  afford  much  instruction  to 
other  countries.  Geneva,  Bern,  and  Neuchatel  are 
among  the  towns  that  have  entered  upon  this  con- 
stitutional reform,  and  in  due  time  Switzerland's  ex- 
perience will  be  of  great  value  to  our  American  com- 
munities, some  of  which  recognize  the  theoretical 
justice  and  advantage  of  minority  representation 
without  having  found  any  simple  and  practicable  mo- 
dus operandi.  The  Swiss  are  by  no  means  sure  that 
they  have  as  yet  discovered  a  method  that  they  can 
widely  commend.  Switzerland  contains  none  of  the 
huge  hives  of  town-dwellers  that  are  found  in  the 
larger  European  countries ;  but  its  town  government 
is,  nevertheless,  in  many  ways  worthy  to  be  studied, 
and  in  some  to  be  imitated.  In  all  cantons,  German, 
French,  and  Italian  alike,  the  general  town  council 
forms  the  central  fact  in  the  municipal  government. 

The  phenomenon  of  rapid  city  growth  is,  to  be 
sure,  observable  in  Russia  as  elsewhere  in  Europe,  es- 
pecially since  1880.  The  story  of  the  creation  of  St. 
Petersburg  as  a  new  capital  and  metropolis  deserves  a 
place,  undoubtedly,  in  the  annals  of  modern  city-mak- 
ing. But  the  Russian  empire  for  my  present  pur- 
poses can  scarcely  be  regarded  as  a  part  of  Europe. 
Local  representative  government  has  to  a  limited 
extent  had  a  place  in  the  conduct  of  the  affairs  of 
the  great  Russian  towns,  but  of  late  the  representa- 
tives of  the  house-owners  have  lost  most  of  the  muni- 
cipal authority  they  formerly  possessed,  a  law  of  1894 
greatly  increasing  the  arbitrary  power  of  the  gov- 
ernors named  by  the  emperor  to  rule  over  the  cities. 


PREFACE  xi 

Nor  would  much  benefit  be  derived  from  a  survey 
of  municipal  institutions  in  Southeastern  Europe  be- 
yond the  capital  of  Hungary.  French  engineers  have 
laid  out  the  new  Athens,  the  new  Bucharest,  the  new 
Belgrade  and  the  new  Sofia  ;  and  administrative  sys- 
tems in  the  states  of  the  Balkan  peninsula  show  a 
conspicuous  tendency  to  borrow  from  the  French 
codes.  I  have  witnessed  few  sights  more  memorable 
than  the  Bulgarian  capital  afforded  when  under- 
going the  process  of  transformation  from  a  squalid 
Turkish  farming  village  to  a  pretentious  European 
town.  In  1880  Sofia  was  a  ragged  settlement  of  cow- 
keepers,  with  a  dismantled  old  church  and  a  forlorn 
mosque  or  two.  In  the  present  year,  1895,  Sofia 
can  boast  a  population  of  at  least  fifty  thousand, 
with  all  the  modern  municipal  appointments,  includ- 
ing boulevards  and  electric  lights,  and  not  excluding 
the  accompaniment  of  a  good-sized  municipal  debt. 
Belgrade,  the  Servian  capital,  has  also  grown  rapidly 
since  the  treaty  of  Berlin,  while  from  the  Acropolis 
of  Athens  the  visitor  looks  forth  upon  a  town  almost 
as  new  and  regular  as  a  "West  Superior  or  a  Seattle. 
These  marks  of  town  development  in  southeastern 
Europe  may  be  full  of  novelty  and  interest,  but  they 
are  superficial  as  yet,  and  have  little  or  nothing  to 
teach  us.  The  ordering  of  municipal  affairs  in  a 
German  or  Dutch  or  Swiss  town  on  the  other  hand 
bears  close  inspection  and  gives  many  evidences  of 
a  true  and  admirable  social  progress. 

In  the  preparation  of  this  volume  I  have  found  it 
convenient  to  include  parts  of  four  articles  contrib- 


xii  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

uted  by  me  to  the  "Century  Magazine";  but  they  have 
been  fused  with  a  much  larger  amount  of  new  mate- 
rial in  such  a  manner  as  quite  to  have  lost  their  iden- 
tity. The  Hamburg  chapter  has  been  expanded  and 
rewritten  from  an  article  which  I  contributed  last 
year  to  the  "Atlantic  Monthly"  (Hamburg's  New 
Sanitary  Impulse,  "Atlantic  Monthly  "  for  June,  1894), 
and  which  I  am  kindly  permitted  to  reprint.  A  por- 
tion of  the  third  chapter  has  also  been  borrowed  from 
an  article  of  mine  entitled  "Belgium  and  the  Bel- 
gians," which  appeared  in  the  "Atlantic  Monthly  "  in 
1890.  To  so  many  sources  am  I  indebted  for  infor- 
mation or  for  assistance,  all  the  way  from  Paris  to 
Budapest,  that  I  may  not  venture  to  publish  the 
names  of  those  who  have  aided  me.  I  can  only  re- 
gret that  circumstances  have  not  permitted  me  to 
avail  myself  more  largely  of  their  knowledge  and 
advice. 

New  York,  October,  1895. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  PARIS  :  THE  TYBICAL  MODERN  CITY 1 

II.  THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  . .   146 

III.  THE    SYSTEMS   OF    BELGIUM,  HOLLAND,    AND 

SPAIN  210 

IV.  RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 249 

V.  THE  FRAMEWORK  OF  GERMAN  CITY  GOVERN- 

MENT   289 

VI.  MUNICIPAL  FUNCTIONS  IN  GERMANY 323 

VII.  THE  FREE  CITY  OF  HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANI- 

TARY REFORMS 378 

VIII.  THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 410 

IX.  BUDAPEST:  THE  RISE  OF  A  NEW  METROPOLIS  435 

APPENDICES 

I.  The  Budget  of  Paris 471 

II.  The  Budget  of  Berlin  472 

III.  The  French  Municipal  Code    474 

INDEX  .  493 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT 
IN  CONTINENTAL  EUROPE 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT 

IN 

CONTINENTAL  EUEOPE 


CHAPTER  I 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


THE  distinctively  modern  city  had  its  birth  in  the 
French  Revolution,  and  Paris  has  ever  since  then 
stood  as  its  preeminent  type.  To  French  influence 
several  European  countries  owe  the  administrative 
framework  of  their  municipal  governments,  while 
every  European  capital  has  been  more  or  less  com- 
pletely made  over  in  its  external  forms  upon  Parisian 
models.  The  recent  history  of  municipal  progress  in 
continental  Europe  comprises  much  more,  it  is  true, 
than  an  account  of  the  triumphant  advance  from  coun- 
try to  country,  and  from  capital  to  capital,  of  the  trans- 
forming and  modernizing  influence  of  the  new  Paris : 
yet  no  other  impulse  has  been  so  strong,  no  other 
spirit  so  dominant.  It  would  be  impossible  to  present 
any  complete  reason  why  Brussels,  Berlin,  St.  Peters- 
burg, Dresden,  Vienna,  Budapest,  or  even  Rome  itself, 
is  to-day  what  it  is,  without  bringing  Paris  into  the 
account. 

And  thus  a  volume  which  would  attempt  to  describe 
the  methods  and  achievements  of  modern  municipal 


Relation  of 

Paris  to 

municipal 

progress. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


British 
to  wnsless  in- 
debted than 
continental 
to  French 
ideas. 


Parisian  im- 
press upon 
German 
cities. 


Congestion 
of  the  medie- 
val town. 


government  in  the  different  countries  and  principal 
cities  of  Europe  must  of  necessity  begin  with  Paris, 
for  reasons  of  both  logical  and  historical  sequence. 
London  and  the  great  British  towns,  as  I  have  shown 
in  a  preceding  volume,  have  attained  their  present 
municipal  forms  and  institutions  through  a  process  of 
development  peculiarly  their  own.  It  would  be  easy 
to  show  that  they  too  have  yielded  in  various  ways  to 
the  influence  of  the  French  capital;  but  continental 
ideas  and  achievements  have  been  an  indirect  and 
unperceived  rather  than  a  vital  and  obvious  impetus 
to  the  tasks  of  town  improvement  and  municipal  re- 
form in  the  British  Islands.  If  the  Germans  have 
forgotten,  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  Paris  has  been 
a  prime  influence  in  the  renaissance  not  only  of  Ber- 
lin, but  also  of  Hamburg,  Frankfort,  Stuttgart,  Mu- 
nich, and  Dresden.  Berlin  and  Vienna  have  accom- 
plished magnificent  results  in  modern  city-making, 
and  in  the  past  decade  or  two  they  and  perhaps 
other  continental  cities  outside  of  France  have  adopted 
municipal  appointments  in  some  respects  more  scien- 
tific and  effective  than  those  of  Paris.  But  Paris  was 
the  pioneer,  and  it  has  not  yet  lost  its  place  as  the 
foremost  type  of  the  thoroughly  modernized  city. 
French  public  authorities,  architects,  and  civil  engi- 
neers were  the  first  to  conceive  effectually  the  ideas 
of  symmetry  and  spaciousness,  of  order  and  conve- 
nience, of  wholesomeness  and  cleanliness,  in  urban 
arrangements. 

Those  ideas,  as  embodied  in  the  Paris  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  have  made  their  way  even  to  Constan- 
tinople, and  have  begun  the  conquest  of  the  Oriental 
cities.  The  medieval  European  town  was  a  labyrin- 
thine tangle  of  narrow,  dark,  and  foul  passageways 
and  alleys.  Its  frightful  congestion  was  due  in  most 
cases  to  the  military  cincture  of  wall,  moat,  and  glacis 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


that  yielded  nothing  to  the  growth  of  population. 
The  modern  spirit  has  thrown  the  walls  into  the  moats 
to  make  boulevards  and  open  spaces,  has  laid  down 
broad  and  systematic  thoroughfares  upon  the  obsolete 
tangle  of  haphazard  passages,  has  provided  illumina- 
tion, water-supply,  and  drainage,  and  has  in  short 
created  those  appointments  and  conveniences  that  dis- 
tinguish the  well-ordered  city  of  our  day  from  the  old- 
time  cities  that  had  grown  up  formless  and  organless 
by  centuries  of  accretion.  In  this  brilliant  nineteenth- 
century  task  of  reconstructing  cities  in  their  physical 
characters,  dealing  with  them  as  organic  entities,  and 
endeavoring  to  give  such  form  to  the  visible  body  as 
should  best  accommodate  the  expanding  life  within, 
Paris  has  been  the  unrivaled  leader. 

There  has  been  some  disposition,  however  slight, 
among  English-speaking  people  to  undervalue  French 
civilization  and  to  minimize  the  importance  of  French 
services  to  the  world  at  large.  The  attainments  of 
German  scholarship  in  many  directions  are  so  colossal; 
the  recent  German  applications  of  recondite  scientific 
inquiry  to  the  protection  of  the  public  health,  and  in 
various  ways  to  the  practical  arts  of  lif  e,  have  been  so 
remarkable ;  and  German  energy  and  prestige  are  now 
so  dominant,  that  in  our  admiration  for  the  achieve- 
ments of  this  younger  people  we  are  in  danger,  per- 
haps, of  according  less  than  her  full  due  to  France. 
It  is  something  to  remember  that  all  countries  are 
under  permanent  obligations  to  the  clear  political 
philosophy  that  furnished  the  French  Revolution  with 
its  principles,  while  most  countries  are  not  less  in- 
debted to  modern  France  for  lessons  in  the  science 
and  art  of  public  administration.  Nor  is  it  a  trifling 
debt  we  owe  to  the  refined  and  artistic  tastes  of  the 
French  people  for  a  host  of  the  amenities  and  com- 
forts of  our  modern  lif  e. 


CH4P.  L 


Modern  ur- 
ban expan- 
sion as  in- 
augurated 
by  Paris. 


French  ver- 
sus German 
contribu- 
tions to  so- 
cial progress. 


4  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.         "When  the  French  began  to  teach  the  new  art  of 

building  cities,  men  were  far  from  a  realization  of  the 

city  life  and  f  act  that  the  twentieth  century  was  destined  to  dawn 

weifere.  upon  a  group  of  nations  that  had  adopted  city  life  for 
the  majority  of  their  people;  nor  did  men  perceive 
that  the  mere  difference  bet  veen  good  and  bad  muni- 
cipal arrangements  would  signify  either  the  conserva- 
tion of  the  race  in  bodily  vigor  and  in  the  education 
of  mind  and  hand,  or  else  its  rapid  physical  and  mental 
deterioration.  It  meant  less  for  the  nation  at  large 
that  in  towns  like  the  Paris  of  the  eighteenth  century 
the  death-rate  was  always  higher  than  the  birth-rate, 
for  the  reason  that  the  urban  population  was  in  those 
times  small  in  comparison  with  the  rural.  But  if 
such  a  condition  were  prevalent  in  our  day,  the  con- 
sequences would  be  too  dreadful  to  contemplate.  Yet  it 
is  true  that  without  urban  improvements  of  the  kind 
that  the  French  people  first  instituted,  the  yearly 
number  of  deaths  would  now  considerably  exceed  the 
yearly  number  of  births  in  all  large  centers  of  popu- 
lation. 

It  is  marvelous  to  note  the  ceaseless  operations  of 
the  transforming  energy  derived  from  the  Revolution. 
Rather  inconspicuously  placed  in  a  hallway  of  one  of 
the  buildings  in  which  the  municipal  authorities  of 

Parisian  the  capital  made  their  extraordinary  display  at  the 
tions.  Exposition  of  1889,  was  a  map  that  had  a  fascinating 
interest.  It  was  a  street  map  of  Paris,  showing  by 
different  colors  the  periods  in  which  the  great  boule- 
vards, avenues,  squares,  and  other  visible  improve- 
ments had  been  constructed.  No  change  in  the  higher 
government  had  seemed  to  check  the  mighty  impulse. 
Everything  that  lay  in  the  way  of  the  broad,  straight 
swath  of  a  new  avenue  was  razed  unmercifully,  and 
the  street  system  of  the  old  inner  metropolis  was  made 
to  conform  to  the  systems  of  the  splendid  new  quarters 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY  5 

that  were  springing  into  existence,  especially  toward     CHAP.  i. 
the  west. 

In  the  days  of  the  Revolution  the  site  of  the  pres- 
ent Place  de  la  Concorde,  where  the  guillotine  was  then 
so  active,  was  upon  the  very  western  outskirts  of  Paris, 
while  the  prison  of  the  Bastille  —  whose  destruction  in 
July,  1789,  opened  most  significantly  that  long  course  riesofmo. 
of  wholesale  Parisian  demolition,  in  order  that  free- 
dom, science,  and  sunlight  might  replace  the  oppres- 
sion, ignorance,  and  gloom  of  the  old  regime — was 
then  on  the  eastern  limits,  and  beyond  it  lay  the  open 
country.  North  of  the  inner  line  of  boulevards,  which 
had  been  already  laid  out,  there  was  practically  no 
Paris;  and  south  of  the  H6tel  des  Invalides  and  the 
Luxembourg,  beyond  which  the  vast  city  now  stretches 
so  far,  there  were  in  those  days  fields  and  a  farming 
population. 

It  should  not  be  inferred,  however,  that  these  new 
parts  have  since  arisen  upon  a  ground-plan  wisely  pro- 
vided in  advance.  To  some  extent,  it  is  true,  such  has 
been  the  case,  and  in  the  newest  quarters  of  Paris —  Nature  of 

n  •       T-»  -XT  IT  i  suburban  de- 

ior  instance,  in  Passy,  Neuilly,  and  other  suburbs  be-  veiopment. 
yond  the  gates  on  the  west — the  magnificent  avenues 
have  been  laid  down  upon  the  open  fields,  and  the  ex- 
ercise of  forethought  will  have  saved  all  the  cost  and 
trouble  of  subsequent  reconstruction.  But  even  in 
Paris,  since  the  Revolution,  there  has  been  some  of 
the  improvidence  that  prevails  elsewhere ;  and  while 
the  inevitable  municipal  plow  has  been  cutting  its 
stupendous  furrows  in  one  direction,  new  quarters 
have  been  allowed  to  form  themselves  improperly 
somewhere  else,  with  the  result  of  costly  reconstruc- 
tion when  the  time  comes  for  extending  to  them  the 
main  arterial  system  of  the  metropolis. 

Perhaps  if  parts  of  this  Parisian  transformation  had 
been  delayed  until  a  later  period,  certain  causes  would 
i* 


G 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i.  have  operated  to  make  it  less  thorough.  At  the  close 
of  the  French  Revolution,  and  for  some  decades  there- 
after, there  was  in  Europe  no  sentiment  for  old  archi- 
tectural monuments,  and  especially  none  for  medieval 
churches.  This  sentiment  now  pervades  all  Europe ; 
and  the  most  affectionate  preservation,  with  cautious, 
faithful  restorations,  is  the  order  everywhere. 

Such  a  spirit  was  lacking  in  the  generations  imme- 
diately preceding  our  own,  and  nowhere  was  its  ab- 
sence more  complete  than  in  the  French  capital.  The 
religious  orders  had  built  their  great  monastic  houses 
and  their  splendid  churches  everywhere  in  Paris. 
Destruction  They  were  a  privileged  caste  and  a  heavy  burden. 
churches.  The  Revolution  had  no  mercy  upon  them  or  their  beau- 
tiful architecture,  and  the  new  street  system  plowed 
through  their  churches  as  relentlessly  as  through 
shabby  tenement  rows.  Scores  of  examples  of  the 
most  beautiful  ecclesiastical  structures  of  the  middle 
ages  were  obliterated  to  make  room  for  broad,  straight 
avenues,  open  squares,  and  new,  regular  buildings. 
Nowadays  such  sacrilege  would  not  be  tolerated. 

It  is  fortunate,  therefore,  for  the  Parisians  that  their 
central  street  reforms  were  chiefly  accomplished  before 
the  rise  of  the  new  appreciation  of  church  architec- 
ture. There  are  enough  old  churches  remaining 
throughout  France,  if  not  in  Paris  itself,  to  represent 
adequately  the  beautiful  art  and  workmanship  of  the 
thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries.  The  narrow  old 
Parisian  streets  of  the  last  century  wound  in  and  out 
among  these  venerable  piles  in  a  manner  that  modern 
traffic  could  not  have  endured.  To  have  spared  them 
would  have  been  to  deprive  Paris  forever  of  an  ade- 
quate street  system.  It  was  far  better  to  sacrifice  them 
and  to  make  the  city  uncompromisingly  modern.  The 
population  in  1789  was  about  600,000,  and  in  1889  it 
was  2,500,000,  including  that  of  the  immediate  sub- 


was  the 

"vandalism" 
justifiable  ? 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  7 

urbs.  And  with  the  fourfold  increase  of  population  CHAP.  i. 
there  was  at  least  a  tenfold  increase  of  traffic  and  of 
daily  pressure  upon  the  accommodations  of  the  main 
street  system.  These  facts,  to  my  mind,  fully  vindi- 
cate the  wisdom,  redeem  the  "  vandalism,"  and  justify 
the  immense  cost  of  the  modernization  of  Paris.  It 
was  the  mission  of  France  to  teach  the  world  a  lesson 
of  order,  system,  and  logic,  of  emancipation  and  icono- 
clasm.  Paris  was  made  the  visible  embodiment  of  of  J^P8^ 
the  revolt  against  the  iniquities  of  the  old  regime,  and  new  era. 
of  the  creative  vigor  of  the  new  era.  We  would  not 
wish  to  see  Rome  modernized  in  any  such  spirit ;  and, 
indeed,  the  great  reforms  now  progressing  there,  of 
which  I  shall  write  in  a  subsequent  chapter,  proceed 
upon  the  principle  of  preserving  with  the  greatest 
veneration  and  care  all  important  archaeological  re- 
mains and  all  worthy  specimens  of  ecclesiastical  archi- 
tecture. But  it  was  for  Paris  to  sacrifice  everything  to 
the  modern  ideas  of  symmetry,  spaciousness,  and  regu- 
larity, and  to  build  the  great  opera-house  as  a  central 
feature,  and  as  a  suggestive  symbol  of  the  new  spirit. 

Louis  XIV.  and  Louis  XV.  had  not  been  without     improve- 
ments under 

magnificent  ideas  for  Paris,  and  they  had  left  improve- 
ments — palaces,  royal  pleasure-grounds,  boulevards, 
churches  —  that  make  a  considerable  array  when  put 
into  a  list ;  but  these  things,  done  to  gratify  the  royal 
pride,  had  been  of  almost  no  benefit  to  the  people, 
and  had  not  affected  materially  the  medieval  condi- 
tions. The  absolutism  of  these  monarchs  could  never 
have  availed  to  cut  the  Grordian  knots  of  a  thousand 
claims,  prescriptive  rights,  and  intolerable  immunities 
that  the  nobles,  the  religious  orders,  the  old  guilds,  and 
various  other  corporate  and  private  interests  tena- 
ciously asserted.  Only  a  revolution,  sweeping  every- 
thing away  and  beginning  anew  upon  simple  princi- 
ples, could  have  effected  any  radical  improvement. 


8 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i.  The  work  of  remaking  Paris,  after  the  Revolution, 
was  begun  upon  the  lines  of  a  general  plan  for  the 
cutting  of  new  streets,  prepared  by  a  so-called  "  Com- 
mission des  Artistes."  The  plan  included  108  distinct 

street  re-     proiects.     Although  political  changes  interfered  with 

forms  from  •  «    -i  •  • 

1790  to  1850.  the  full  execution  of  this  particular  plan,  the  work  of 
reconstruction  did  not  cease.  Under  the  great  Na- 
poleon the  rues  de  Rivoli,  Castiglione,  des  Pyramides, 
and  various  other  modern  thoroughfares  were  created. 
To  the  fifteen  years  of  the  Restoration  a  further  con- 
siderable list  must  be  credited,  including,  among 
others,  the  rues  de  Chabrol,  du  29  Juillet,  Lafitte,  and 
those  of  the  Quartier  de  1'Europe.  And  under  Louis 
Philippe  (1830-48)  the  rues  de  Rambuteau,  de  la 
Bourse,  de  Lyon,  du  Havre,  de  Mazagrau,  and  others 
were  opened. 

But  it  was  in  the  period  from  1852  to  1871,  under 
Louis  Napoleon,  that  the  most  comprehensive  and 
magnificent  work  was  done.  A  huge  scheme  was  laid 
out,  under  the  supervision  of  Baron  Haussmann  as 
prefect  of  the  Seine,  for  the  binding  together  of  all 
the  quarters  of  Paris  by  a  system  of  grand  avenues  of 
general  communication. 

The  reforms  immediately  following  the  Revolution 
had  dealt  almost  exclusively  with  the  astounding  con- 
gestion at  the  very  heart  of  Paris.  Nobody  but  the 
student  could  now  believe  the  whole  truth  about  the 
changes  that  have  been  wrought  since  1790  in  the  vi- 
cinity of  the  Louvre.  The  original  Paris,  ancient 
Lutetia,  was  nothing  more  than  the  island  in  the 
Seine  upon  which  the  Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame  stands. 
This  lie  de  la  Cite,  as  it  is  still  called,  contained  at  the 
period  of  the  Revolution  a  great  number  of  small 
streets,  fifteen  or  twenty  churches,  and  a  population 
of  twenty  thousand  or  more.  Those  who  visit  it  to- 
day find  the  island  given  over  to  a  few  great  public 


The  Hauss- 
mann 
scheme. 


Beconstruc 

tion  of  the 

lie  de  la 

Cite. 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


buildings  —  the  Central  Courts  of  Justice  (Palais  de 
Justice),  an  immense  hospital  (Hotel  Dieu),  the  Prefec- 
ture of  Police,  the  Tribunal  of  Commerce,  and  two  or 
three  other  public  establishments.  It  is  flanked  by 
broad,  smooth  stone  quays,  is  symmetrically  laid  out 
with  open  squares  and  a  few  spacious  streets,  and  not 
more  than,  perhaps,  one  tenth  of  its  area  is  occupied 
by  private  buildings.  Thousands  of  small,  ancient 
houses  were  cleared  away,  and  the  modern  lie  de  la 
Cite",  with  the  restored  cathedral,  the  splendid  quays, 
the  massive  public  edifices,  the  new  bridges,  the  flower- 
market,  and  the  morgue,  made  its  appearance.  A 
like  transformation  was  wrought  in  that  central  por- 
tion of  Paris  lying  between  the  Louvre  and  the  Hotel 
de  Ville  (City  Hall),  covered  as  it  was  with  ancient 
huddled  structures,  among  which  narrow  passages 
wound  bewilderingly,  and  where  culs-de-sac  were  found 
by  the  score.  And  thus  also  an  examination  of  the 
maps  and  the  historical  monographs  prepared  by 
scholars  who  have  restored  for  our  knowledge  the 
Paris  of  1789,  would  show  that  the  other  innermost 
parts  of  the  metropolis  were  boldly  and  ruthlessly  dealt 
with  in  the  decades  following  the  upheaval. 

The  task  that  the  Emperor  Louis  Napoleon  set  be- 
fore himself  related  not  so  much  to  the  inner  Paris  of 
the  old-time  bounds — although  his  scheme  also  em- 
braced prodigious  reforms  in  the  central  area — as  to 
the  great  town  that  had  spread  itself  beyond  the  inner 
boulevards,  and  that  lacked  a  main  circulatory  sys- 
tem. Not  only  did  the  outlying  arrondissements  need 
broad  avenues  of  communication  with  the  center  and 
with  each  other,  but  the  very  fact  of  their  existence, 
making  a  heightened  traffic-pressure  upon  the  old 
streets  of  the  inner  district,  demanded  the  amplifica- 
tion of  facilities  at  the  core.  With  a  bold  and  sympa- 
thetic spirit  like  Baron  Haussmann  as  prefect  of  the 


CHAP.  I. 


Demolitions 

in  the 

Louvre 

vicinity. 


Projects  of 
the  Third 
Empire. 


10 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i. 


Theremak- 
metropolis, 


The  system 


Department  of  the  Seine  (in  effect  the  Emperor's  ap- 
pointed and  permanent  mayor  of  Paris),  and  with  no 
authority  to  obstruct  the  rapid  execution  of  his  mag- 
nificent plans,  Napoleon  proceeded  to  reconstruct 
Paris  as  a  Pullman  Company  creates  a  model  town, 
or  as  the  director-general  of  a  universal  exposition 
lays  out  his  spacious  grounds  and  arranges  his  showy 
edifices.  Haussmann  held  his  post  from  1853  to  1870; 
and  in  that  period  he  had  created  gigantic  boulevards 
and  avenues  by  the  hundred;  had  laid  out  great  num- 
bers and  large  areas  of  open  squares,  parks,  and  plea- 
sure-grounds; had  erected  public  buildings  in  all  parts 
of  Paris;  had  with  equal  energy  developed  a  sewer 
system  and  created  a  water-supply;  and  had  given  the 
people  a  scheme  of  public  services  far  in  advance  of 
any  other  great  city  of  that  period. 

The  plan  of  the  new  Paris  is  by  no  means  so  geo- 
metrical and  easily  understood  as  that  of  Washington 
(which,  it  should  be  remembered,  was  laid  out  by  a 
French  engineer,  who  had  brought  to  America  the 
impulse  and  the  ideas  of  the  Parisian  Commission  des 
Artistes),  but  it  is  none  the  less  a  philosophical  and 
practical  arrangement.  Originally  the  narrow  streets 
and  lanes  of  Paris  were  either  parallel  with  the  Seine 
in  general  direction,  or  were  at  right  angles  with  the 
river.  It  became  necessary  to  give  the  new  Paris 
main  thoroughfares  broad  enough  and  straight  enough 
to  accommodate  traffic  through  the  heart  of  the  city 
along  these  original  lines.  Further,  it  was  deemed 
necessary  to  construct  a  great  number  of  diagonal 
avenues  and  boulevards  directly  connecting  important 
localities.  Still  further,  new  lines  of  engirdling  boule- 
vards were  found  desirable;  and  finally,  there  were 
important  reforms  to  be  instituted  in  the  suburban 
street  systems.  The  net  public  expenditure  incurred 
between  1852  and  1870  in  carrying  out  the  Hauss- 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  11 

mann-Napoleon  project  of  new  boulevards  and  ave-  CHAP.  i. 
nues  was  in  excess  of  1,200,000,000  francs.  The  gross 
outlay  was  much  greater,  but  large  amounts  of  the 
original  investment  were  recovered  from  time  to  time 
by  the  sale  of  building  sites,  the  municipality  having, 
by  condemnation  proceedings  in  every  case,  acquired 
the  properties  through  which  in  part  a  new  street 
would  pass. 

After  1870  the  work  naturally  proceeded  with  less 
energy,  on  account  of  military  reverses,  political 
changes,  and  heavy  expenditures  in  other  directions. 
But  a  number  of  important  new  projects  have  been 
carried  out  since  1875,  and  each  year  sees  some  addi- 
tion to  the  main  street  system.  Private  individuals  private 
have  been  obliged  to  conform  strictly  to  the  plans  PcontroUed.y 
and  regulations  of  the  municipality  in  building  up  the 
new  frontage,  and  thus  there  has  resulted  that  mar- 
velous regularity  —  elegant  and  impressive  rather  than 
monotonous  —  which  is  the  characteristic  of  Parisian 
street  architecture.  The  period  since  the  war  with 
Germany  has  witnessed  a  greater  fidelity  in  matters 
of  detail,  a  higher  degree  of  artistic  taste  and  skill, 
and  a  stricter  and  more  businesslike  financiering. 
For  nearly  twenty  years  (from  the  war  till  his  death  Aiphandand 
in  about  1893)  the  distinguished  administrator  M.  cent  street 


Alphand,  as  director  of  the  public  works  of  Paris, 

gave  his  unceasing  and  comprehensive  attention  to 

all  the  problems  that  belong  to  the  street  system,  the 

public  architecture,  the  water-supply,  and  the  drainage 

of  a  great  city,  and  the  list  of  his  achievements  -would 

fill  many  pages.     Under  his  supervision  the  Avenue    Avenue  de 

de  1'Opera  was  constructed,  with  brilliant   financial 

success,  involving  the  renovation  of  the  Butte  des 

Moulins,  one  of  the  worst  of  surviving  slum  quarters. 

To  this  period  belong  the  boulevards  Saint-Germain 

and  Henri  IV.,  and  many  another  great  thoroughfare. 


12 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Reforms 
under  the 

Third 
Republic. 


Magnitude 

of  recent 

operations. 


In  the  summer  of  1891;  on  the  occasion  of  the  formal 
opening  of  the  new  Avenue  de  la  Republique,  the  pre- 
fect remarked:  "Important  as  this  avenue  publicly 
opened  to-day  may  be,  it  merely  adds  one  more  to  the 
network  of  highways  of  communication  which  within 
twenty  years  has  given  a  new  physiognomy  to  the 
capital.  The  misfortunes  of  war  retarded  for  a  time 
this  movement  of  transfiguration;  but  as  soon  as 
France  had  regained  possession  of  herself,  Paris  set 
herself  to  the  task.  Works  of  general  utility  rapidly 
succeeded  one  another,  with  tangible  results  that  have 
been  augmented  a  hundredfold  by  the  concurrent 
activity  of  private  enterprise,  and  the  confidence  of 
private  capital  in  the  public  projects  of  development." 
The  prefect  goes  on  to  recount  the  directions  in  which 
the  work  of  public  improvement  has  accomplished 
most  since  1871 ;  and  he  makes  a  very  impressive 
summary.  Indeed,  the  public  works  that  have  been 
executed  in  the  twenty  years  from  1875  to  1895  have 
in  all  likelihood  cost  a  larger  sum  in  the  aggregate 
than  those  carried  out  in  the  twenty  years  following 
the  coup  d'etat  of  July,  1851.  The  Haussmann  trans- 
formations were  begun  when  Paris  had  only  a  million 
people  and  an  area  of  only  thirteen  square  miles.  Their 
scope  was  enlarged  when  in  1861  the  boundaries  were 
extended  to  the  girdle  of  fortifications  and  made  to 
include  thirty  square  miles,  with  a  total  population  of 
1,700,000.  But  in  1875  the  authorities  had  to  provide 
for  nearly  two  million  people,  a  number  that  in  1895 
was  fast  approaching  three  millions.  These  last  two 
decades  have  witnessed  transformations  less  preten- 
tious and  not  so  widely  advertised,  but  touching  more 
closely  and  deeply  the  lives  of  the  people,  and  minis- 
tering more  perfectly  to  the  best  demands  of  modern 
civilization.  Services  of  education,  of  cleanliness  and 
of  health,  on  a  vast  and  varied  scale,  have  occupied 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


13 


CHAP.  I. 


Social  ser- 
vices now 
take  first 
rank. 


the  administrative  machinery  that  was  once  so  en- 
grossed with  boulevards  and  architecture.  These  out- 
ward aggrandizements  have  had  attention  too,  and 
the  public  works  have  been  carried  to  perfections  of 
detail  that  Napoleon's  officials  could  hardly  have  an- 
ticipated. But  greater  stress  in  the  period  of  the 
third  republic  has  been  laid  upon  the  less  palpable 
but  no  less  important  social  services  that  enlist  at 
once  the  best  efforts  of  engineers,  architects,  sanita- 
rians, sociologists,  educators,  artists,  and  philanthro- 
pists; and  thus  municipal  Paris  to-day,  as  never 
before,  is  equipped  for  the  positive  promotion  of  the 
well-being  of  all  its  people,  old  and  young. 


In  Paris  before  the  Revolution  there  was,  as  Mr. 
Frederic  Harrison  has  said,  "  a  chaos  of  competing 
authorities,  a  tangle  of  obsolete  privileges,  and  a  nest 
of  scandalous  abuses.  Anomalous  courts  jostled  and 
scrambled  for  jurisdiction;  ancient  guilds  and  cor- 
porations blocked  every  reform;  atrocious  injustice 
and  inveterate  corruption  reigned  high-handed  in  the 
name  of  king,  noble,  or  church."  This,  indeed,  does  The  old-time 
not  tell  us  what  the  mechanism  of  the  municipal  gov-  regime. 
ernment  was,  but  it  shows  us  well  enough  its  spirit 
and  its  results.  For  our  purpose  it  suffices  to  add 
that  the  city,  so  far  as  it  was  centrally  governed,  was 
administered  by  a  provost,  or  mayor,  deriving  author- 
ity directly  from  the  king;  and  that  various  old,  sur- 
viving local  bodies  shared,  in  an  anomalous  way,  in 
the  minor  affairs  of  the  municipality. 

The  liberal  legislation  of  1789-90  gave  Paris,  with 
the  other  communes  of  France,  a  fully  constituted, 
autonomous  municipal  government.  The  city  was 
divided  into  forty-eight  sections,  each  of  which  elected 
two  common  councilors,  in  addition  to  which  a  body 
of  thirty-two  councilors  of  higher  rank,  or  aldermen, 


The  home- 
rule  system 
as  adopted 
in  1790. 


14 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT    IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Changed  by 
the  Direct- 
ory in  1795. 


How  Napo- 
leon gov- 
erned Paris. 


The  master- 
ful prefect. 


The  elective 

council  of 

1830. 


were  elected,  while  the  executive  work  was  intrusted 
to  a  popularly  elected  mayor  and  sixteen  administra- 
tors, so  called.  The  whole  body  of  145  governed  the 
city,  the  mayor  presiding  over  the  council  and  direct- 
ing the  active  administration.  In  the  fact  of  the  pop- 
ular election  of  the  mayor  this  constitution  resembles 
those  of  our  American  cities.  The  councilors  and  ad- 
ministrators were  elected  for  two-year  terms,  half  of 
the  places  being  filled  annually.  It  was  a  fairly  ac- 
ceptable form  of  municipal  government.  But  the 
Directory,  in  1795,  with  its  theory  of  cantonal  adminis- 
tration, consolidated  the  smaller  communes  of  France 
and  cut  up  the  larger  ones.  Paris  was  divided  into  a 
dozen  municipalities,  with  some  sort  of  central  admin- 
istrative bureau,  which  the  Directory  constituted  and 
managed  in  its  own  interest.  The  work  that  the  Di- 
rectory began,  Napoleon  completed.  He  abolished 
absolutely  the  central  mayoralty,  and  created  the  sem- 
blance of  a  central  communal  council,  all  the  mem- 
bers of  which  were  his  own  appointees.  In  each  of 
the  twelve  sections,  or  arrondissements,  as  they  have 
since  that  time  been  called,  he  established  a  so-called 
mayor,  with  assistants.  But  these  officers  were  sim- 
ply the  local  agents  of  the  prefect,  and  were  in  no 
usual  sense  municipal  authorities.  The  real  governor 
of  Paris  was  the  prefect  of  the  Department  of  the 
Seine  —  a  department  including  Paris  and  some  sub- 
urban communes.  All  administration  was  in  his  hands. 
In  the  levying  of  taxes  and  the  planning  of  public 
works  he  had  the  advice  of  the  municipal  council  of 
Paris  and  of  the  council-general  of  the  department, 
all  the  members  of  which  were  the  appointees  of  the 
central  power.  The  revolution  of  1830  improved  mat- 
ters to  the  extent  of  giving  to  Parisians  of  certain 
electoral  qualifications  the  right  to  choose  the  munici- 
pal council.  But  the  central  mayoralty  was  not  re- 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  15 

vived,  and  the  prefect,  with  his  subordinates,  and     CHAP.  i. 
with  the  appointive  officers  of  the  arrondissements, 
governed  the  city  still. 

As  in  the  country  at  large,  so  in  Paris  the  brilliant 
revolution  of  1848  restored  for  a  brief  interval  the    briefly°r"-y 
autonomy  of  communities.  Paris  again  had  its  elected     s  i848.m 
municipal  council,  its  own  chosen  mayor  and  execu- 
tive staff.     But  the  empire  of  Louis  Napoleon  took 
the  city  completely  out  of  the  hands  of  its  inhabitants   metkods^e- 
and  restored  the  system  of  the  first  empire.     The  na-     yiim]n 
tional  assembly  of  1871,  after  the  downfall  of  the 
empire,  restored  to  Paris  its   elective  council,   but 
stopped  there,  promising  that  further  concessions  to 
the  principle  of  self-government  should  be  made  at  concessions 
some  subsequent  time.  Since  then  the  suffrage,  which    smee  1871> 
was  virtually  universal,  has  been  made  entirely  so. 
But  Paris  is  still  actively  governed,  as  under  Louis 
Napoleon,  by  the  prefect  of  the  Seine  and  his  col- 
league, the  prefect  of  police,  both  of  whom  are  ap- 
pointed by  the  general  government  and  are  amenable 
directly  to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior.  In  the  smaller 
communes  of  France  the  police  power  is  now  confided 
to  the  municipal  authorities,  and  is  exercised  actively 
by  the  mayors.     In  the  larger  ones  a  purely  domestic 
police  authority  is  exercised  by  the  municipal  officers, 
while  a  general  control  of  police  is  vested  in  the  pre- 
fect and  his  sub-prefects.     But  Paris  is  deemed  too 
vast  for  the  union  of  ordinary  business  administration 
and  police  administration  in  the  hands  of  the  one 
prefect  of  the  department;  and  the  police  authority, 
covering  a  wider  range  of  functions  than  the  simple    authority. 
organization  of  the  police  force  and  the  management 
of  the  police  courts  and  station-houses,  is  put  in  the 
hands  of  a  separate  official,  the  prefect  of  police. 

Paris  has  now  for  many  years  been  subdivided  into 
twenty  arrondissements,  and  in  each  of  them  there  is 


16  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.     a  central  building  called  the  "mairie,"  in  which  is 
_    ,      ,     the  bureau  of  an  officer  called  the  "maire"  (mayor). 

The  twenty  v        J       ' 

He  is  assisted  by  three  adjuncts.  These  men,  who 
are  appointed  officers  of  the  general  government, 
and  are,  in  fact,  simply  the  agents  or  delegates 
of  the  prefect  of  the  Seine,  with  a  staff  of  clerks 
and  assistants,  attend  to  a  vast  amount  of  routine 
business  for  the  higher  authorities  and  for  the  city 
so  far  as  the  population  of  their  several  arrondis- 
sements  is  concerned.  They  make  the  registration 
centers  of  lists  for  election  s.  They  record  births,  deaths,  and 

local  admin-  .....  ,          .    .,  . 

istration.  weddings,  and  perform  the  civil  ceremony  of  mar- 
riage. They  receive  taxes,  have  to  do  with  matters 
of  elementary  education,  render  "  assistance  publique," 
— *.  e.,  administer  the  poor  laws  in  their  respective 
districts, — enroll  under  the  army-service  acts  those 
liable  to  military  duty,  and  perform  various  other 
routine  functions.  These  twenty  Parisian  centers 
of  local  administration  are  admirably  organized  and 
conducted,  and  under  any  scheme  whatsoever  of  a 
reconstructed  municipal  government  they  would  be 
allowed  to  remain. 

The  municipal  council  of  Paris  consists  of  eighty 
. ,    members,  four  from  each  of  the  twenty  arrondisse- 

The  munici-  •• 

pai  council,  ments.  Each  arrondissement  is  subdivided  into  four 
quarters,  and  each  quarter  elects  a  municipal  coun- 
cilor. They  are  elected  for  three  years,  and  all  retire 
together.  The  municipal  council  of  Paris,  plus  a  few 
representatives  of  the  outlying  communes  of  the  De- 
partment of  the  Seine,  constitutes  the  council-general 
of  the  department.  Since  these  outlying  communes 
suburban  (grouped  in  the  two  arrondissements  of  Sceaux  and 

cov6rniii6nt 

—the  DC-     Saint  Denis)  are,  in  fact,  the  immediate  suburbs  of 

these"™.0    Paris,  there  seems  to  be  no  good  reason  why  the  city's 

jurisdiction  should  not  be  made  coextensive  with  that 

of  the  department,  so  that  the  business  of  the  municipal 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


17 


council  and  that  of  the  council-general  might  be 
merged.  The  communes  outside  the  fortifications  of 
Paris  have  their  elective  councils  and  distinct  muni- 
cipal organizations,  but  all  come  under  the  common 
executive  control  of  the  two  prefects. 

Ever  since  1871  there  has  been  a  constant  demand 
upon  the  part  of  Paris,  as  represented  by  its  muni- 
cipal council,  for  a  restoration  of  its  central  mayor- 
alty and  a  release  from  its  alleged  position  of  tute- 
lage. The  situation  of  the  council  is  declared  to  be 
humiliating  and  unsatisfactory.  Its  champions  as- 
sert that  it  is  dominated  by  the  prefect,  who  has  the 
right  to  attend  its  sessions  and  to  take  the  floor 
whenever  he  pleases,  and  who  is  absolutely  unac- 
countable to  it  for  his  management  of  the  city's  busi- 
ness. The  council  has,  it  is  true,  large  discretionary 
power  over  finances  and  taxation,  and  indirectly  con- 
trols most  of  the  departments  of  administration,  and 
the  construction  of  public  works,  through  its  hold 
upon  the  purse-strings.  But  the  complaint  is  made 
that  it  is,  at  best,  hampered  and  restricted.  The  pre- 
fect is  in  theory  accountable  to  the  Minister  of  the 
Interior :  but  the  prefect  has  not  only  to  administer 
the  affairs  of  the  city,  but  also  to  act  as  the  political 
representative  of  the  government  of  the  day ;  and  in 
fact  it  is  in  his  character  as  the  political  agent  of  the 
government,  we  are  told,  that  he  is  held  account- 
able. French  ministries  are  too  short-lived,  and  too 
busy  with  interests  more  vitally  affecting  themselves, 
to  permit  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  to  hold  the 
prefect  of  the  Seine  to  a  frequent  and  careful  ac- 
counting for  the  ordinary  administration  of  the  af- 
fairs of  Paris.  Such  is  the  argument  of  the  Parisian 
autonomists. 

There  is  some  reason  to  believe  that  Paris  may 
ultimately  be  given  its  own  elective  mayor  and  ex- 


CHAP.  i. 


A  central 
mayoralty 
demanded. 


i^6  autono- 

mist  argu- 


18 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


A  proposed 
new  consti- 
tution for 
Paris. 


Election  of 

mayor  and 

adjuncts  of 

council. 


ecutive  corps,  but  there  is  no  immediate  prospect  of 
such  a  change.  The  question  has  been  much  con- 
sidered by  the  municipal  council.  A  few  years  ago  a 
council  committee  of  which  Sigismuud  Lacroix  was 
chairman  reported  an  interesting  scheme  of  muni- 
cipal organization  for  Paris.  Nothing  serious  ever 
came  of  it,  and  reforms  on  paper  are  too  numerous 
in  France  to  be  remembered  from  one  season  to  the 
next.  Nevertheless,  Lacroix's  plan  possesses  for  our 
purposes  a  certain  illustrative  value  because  it  em- 
bodies French  views  of  municipal  organization  for  a 
great  city.  It  provided  for  a  council  consisting  of  at 
least  four  members  from  each  arrondissement,  but 
with  additional  representation  for  the  larger  ones, 
increasing  the  total  body  from  eighty  to  one  hundred 
and  nine  members.  The  councilors  were  to  be  elected 
for  three  years,  one  third  retiring  annually,  as  in 
England,  and  the  elections  were  to  be  upon  a  general 
arrondissement  ticket — a  great  improvement  upon 
the  present  plan  of  "uninominal"  election  in  quar- 
ters, which  necessarily  tends  to  fill  the  council  with 
obscure  men.  It  was  provided  that  this  council 
should  be  free  from  the  present  possibilities  of  sus- 
pension and  dissolution  by  the  higher  authorities. 

Paris  is  the  only  French  city  that  is  without  its 
own  mayor,  Lyons  having  recently  been  allowed  to 
resume  a  full-fledged  municipal  government  after 
years  of  tutelage  similar  to  that  of  Paris.  The  La- 
croix proposition  authorized  the  council  to  elect  from 
its  own  membership  a  mayor  and  eight  adjuncts, 
forming  an  executive  corps.  Each  of  the  adjuncts 
was  to  be  assigned  to  the  leadership  of  a  municipal 
department,  for  which  he  should  be  responsible  to 
the  council,  while  the  mayor  was  made  accountable 
in  a  general  way  ab  chairman  of  the  executive  corps. 
The  mayor  and  the  adjuncts  were  to  keep  their  seats 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  19 

in  the  municipal  council,  with  power  to  speak  and  to     CHAP.  i. 
vote.    In  all  the  other  French  cities  the  mayor  is     TO  have 
also  the  presiding  officer  of  the  council;  but  Lacroix's   "^Smcu. 
committee  held  that  in  the  case  of  Paris  it  would  be 
advisable  for  the  council  to  relieve  that  functionary 
from  the  routine  duties  of  the  presidency,  and  to 
name  another  member  of  the  council  for  the  task  of 
the  speakership  of  the  municipal  parliament.    The  ex- 
ecutive corps — i.e.,  the  mayor  and  his  eight  adjuncts 
— was  invested  with  the  appointing  and  removing 
power  for  all  employees  and  agents  of  the  municipal 
administration,  upon  the  initiative  of  the  adjunct 
whose  particular  department  was  concerned.    To  do 
the  routine  work  now  done  in  the  mairie  buildings  of 
the  arrondissements,  it  was  provided  that  four  or  five 
officials  should  be  appointed  by  the  mayor's  corps  as 
"  delegates  of  the  mairie/'  to  render  the  services  now 
performed  by  the  agents  of  the  prefect.    The  council 
was  to  have  full  control  of  taxation  and  finance,  but  Admmistra- 
could  not  borrow  money  without  the  direct  ratifica-     ^luce. 
tion  of  the  voters  at  a  popular  election.    The  muni- 
cipal authorities  were  to  have  entire  management  of  the 
educational  system,  primary,  secondary,  and  higher. 

Apart  from  the  peculiar  conditions  under  which 
Paris  is  placed,  these  propositions,  as  it  seems  to  me, 
embody  an  excellent  municipal  constitution.     Its  har-  An  excellent 
mony  and  simplicity  are  not  the  least  of  its  merits,    firework. 
Although  it  was  an  unrealized  project,  it  is  worthy  of 
notice  as  an  indication  of  what  current  European  judg- 
ment and  experience  would  pronounce  a  good  frame- 
work of  municipal  organization. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  all  elements  in  Paris 
are  clamorous  for  a  larger  degree  of  municipal  au- 

The  conser- 

tonomy.     The  educated  and  propertied  classes,  as  a    vative  sen- 
rule,  prefer  that  the  general  government  should  keep       Paris. 
its  strong  hand  upon  Parisian  administration.     They 


20 

CHAP.  i.  are  somewhat  distrustful  of  the  municipal  council, 
which  they  regard  as  radical  and  socialistic  in  its  ten- 
dencies. There  is  very  much  to  be  said  upon  both 
sides.  Paris  has  always,  except  for  the  brief  inter- 
vals of  the  first  and  second  republics,  been  administered 
by  the  central  authorities.  The  change  of  prefects 
has  at  times  been  frequent  as  ministries  have  risen 
and  fallen ;  but  the  skilled  administrative  heads  of 
the  various  municipal  services,  together  with  their 
corps  of  trained  civil  servants,  have  been  practically 
>ralme°nt!rn  permanent.  It  has  been  possible  to  carry  out  great 
policies  of  public  improvement,  and  there  has  been  a 
high  and  well-ordered  efficiency  in  the  execution  of 
all  kinds  of  municipal  functions.  If  the  municipal 
council  had  been  all-powerful,  it  is  possible  that  pub- 
lic business  would  have  been  less  effectively  prose- 
cuted, and  also  that  public  works  would  have  been 
upon  a  less  magnificent  scale.  Upon  the  other  hand, 
it  is  possible  that  the  real  welfare  of  the  masses  of 
the  Parisian  people  would  have  been  more  carefully 
guarded  in  some  respects,  and  that  the  burdens  of 
taxation  would  have  been  lighter.  These  are  con- 
troverted questions,  and  I  am  not  able  to  answer 
them. 

The  municipal  council  certainly  contains  a  number 

of  able  and  honest  men ;  but  as  a  whole  it  is  open  to 

the  charge  of  being  a  body  of  men  mediocre  and  un- 

character  of  known,  and  the  primary  reason  for  this  is  plain  enough. 

members.  Each  member  is  elected  in  a  separate  district,  eighty 
in  all.  The  opportunity  for  what  we  in  America  call 
"  ward  politics  "  is  altogether  too  favorable.  It  is  not, 
of  course,  legally  requisite  that  the  councilor  should 
be  a  resident  of  the  quarter  he  represents,  but  in  prac- 
tice he  is  likely  to  be.  Candidate  A  placards  the  quar- 
ter with  gaudy  posters  declaring  that  as  a  resident  he 
can  represent  the  people  far  more  satisfactorily  than 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  21 

candidate  B,  who  lives  in  an  arrondissement  at  the     CHAP.  i. 
opposite  end  of  the  city.    "Whereupon  candidate  B     Effector 
issues  a  manifesto  in  which  he  promises  to  obviate    sTicts!s" 
the  difficulty  by  taking  a  residence  in  the  quarter  if 
he  is  elected. 

Such  a  system  does  not  tend  to  fill  the  council  with 
men  known  to  Paris  at  large.  Election  upon  a  gen- 
eral arrondissement  ticket,  as  proposed  in  the  Lacroix 
draft,  and  as  harmonizing  with  the  general  municipal 
system  of  France,  would  result  in  greatly  improving 
the  average  quality  of  the  council.  I  am  inclined  to 
the  opinion  that  it  would  be  still  better  to  elect  a  por-  D0Tekctioif 
tion  of  the  council  upon  a  general  ticket  for  the  whole  ^ickets?1 
city,  with  the  idea  of  securing  men  of  acknowledged 
note  and  standing  for  candidates.  While,  then,  I  must 
confess  some  sympathy  with  the  idea  of  greater  mu- 
nicipal autonomy  for  Paris,  I  can  also  appreciate 
the  reasons  which  actuate  conservative  Parisians,  re- 
membering the  horrors  of  the  communal  uprising  of 
1871,  in  clinging  to  the  strong  arm  of  France. 

I  would  not  for  a  moment  have  it  inferred  that  the 
council  of  Paris  as  at  present  constituted  is  not  a  more 
intelligent  and  efficient  body  of  men  than  the  average 
council  or  aldermanic  board  of  a  large  American  city,  standing  of 

the  Paris 

If  it  had  somewhat  more  control  over  the  executive  council. 
administration,  and  if  it  were  elected  upon  a  less  mi- 
nutely local  plan,  I  believe  that  it  would  soon  become 
a  magnificent  assembly  to  which  it  would  be  a  great 
honor  to  belong  —  superior,  possibly,  in  distinction  to 
the  councils  of  Berlin  and  Vienna,  and  equal  to  the 
new  council  of  metropolitan  London.  Such  positions 
should  have  no  emoluments,  or  else  should  have  large 
ones.  A  Paris  councilor  is  not  supposed  to  draw  a 
salary,  but  he  has  been  accustomed  to  allow  himself 
4000  francs  a  year  for  expenses.  In  view  of  excep- 
tional demands,  he  increased  this  allowance  for  the 


22 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


National 

claims  upon 

Paris. 


Reasonable- 
ness of  na- 
tional parti- 
cipation in 
Parisian 
government. 


Exposition  year  1889  to  6000  francs  ($1200),  and  he 
has  since  neglected  to  reduce  it. 

To  understand  aright  the  municipal  system  of  Paris, 
one  must  bear  constantly  in  mind  the  relationship  that 
the  capital  city  bears  to  the  nation.  The  citizens  of 
Marseilles  have  comparatively  little  interest  in  the 
municipal  affairs  of  Lyons.  Local  institutions  in  the 
provinces  concern  only  the  localities  or  the  provinces 
individually.  France  as  a  whole  has  ordained  a  cer- 
tain uniformity  in  the  type  of  local  government,  and 
has  retained  from  the  Napoleonic  era  a  centralized 
system  of  executive  oversight;  but  in  ordinary  mat- 
ters France  has  no  disposition  to  interfere  with  mu- 
nicipal and  communal  self-government.  The  case  of 
Paris,  however,  is  wholly  exceptional.  The  great  capi- 
tal city  is  regarded  as  belonging  not  alone  to  its  citi- 
zens but  also  to  all  the  people  of  France.  Its  mag- 
nificence has  been  attained  in  large  measure  at  the 
cost  of  the  national  treasury,  through  many  decades 
and  under  different  dynasties  and  forms  of  govern- 
ment. The  French  nation  at  large  is  not  conscious 
of  any  feeling  of  hostility  toward  Paris,  and  has  no 
other  policy  for  the  capital  than  one  of  ambitious  lib- 
erality. The  aggregation  of  national  establishments 
at  Paris  is  something  without  parallel  in  any  other 
country.  The  central  government  continues  by  yearly 
subventions  to  bear  a  considerable  portion  of  the  cost 
of  various  departments  of  the  municipal  administra- 
tion. Inasmuch  as  the  governmental  organs  of -the 
French  republic  are  all  of  them  centered  in  Paris,  a 
municipal  government  carried  on  by  a  prefect  who  is 
directly  accountable  to  the  national  rather  than  to  the 
municipal  chamber  does  not  of  necessity  result  in 
friction.  Upon  its  face,  the  demand  for  a  mayor  to 
be  elected  by  the  municipal  council  of  Paris  would 
seem  at  first  to  be  reasonable;  but  a  more  careful 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


23 


study  of  the  situation,  both  theoretically  and  praeti-  CHAP.  i. 
cally,  has  led  me  to  the  conclusion  that  as  satisfactory 
results  are  probably  obtainable  through  the  present 
system,  which  unites  national  and  local  authority  in 
the  government  of  Paris,  as  would  flow  from  one  which 
would  seem  to  give  the  citizens  a  higher  degree  of 
autonomy. 

Certainly  the  government  of  Paris  at  first  seems  to 
divide  responsibilities  in  a  manner  likely  to  produce 
constant  friction,  and  to  interfere  most  distractingly 
with  the  accomplishment  of  large  plans  requiring 
harmony  and  foresight.  The  municipal  council,  The  sphere 
elected  by  the  votes  of  all  the  citizens  of  the  eighty  council 
quarters,  meets  in  its  sumptuous  hall  in  the  Hotel 
de  Ville  almost  every  day  to  debate  all  points  of 
municipal  policy  and  outlay.  In  its  hands  rests  the 
all-essential  power  to  vote  supplies  or  to  withhold 
them.  Its  eight  or  ten  large  standing  committees 
are  at  pains  to  acquaint  themselves  with  all  the  de- 
partments of  practical  municipal  activity. 

But  this  municipal  council  has  no  immediate 
authority  over  the  administrative  machine.  The 
prefect  of  the  Department  of  the  Seine,  who  owes 
his  appointment  to  the  general  government,  and 
whose  immediate  superior  is  the  Minister  of  the  In-  The  sphere 
terior,  is  in  fact  the  mayor  of  Paris,  with  complete  prefect 
executive  authority ;  that  is  to  say,  his  authority  is 
complete  within  the  sphere  assigned  to  him,  and 
is  incomplete  only  to  the  extent  of  those  municipal 
tasks  the  management  of  which  has  been  confided 
by  law  to  the  prefect  of  police.  For  limited  and 
well-defined  purposes,  the  prefect  of  police  may  also 
be  regarded  as  mayor  of  Paris.  In  theory,  it  is 
somewhat  difficult  to  draw  the  line  that  separates 
the  jurisdiction  of  these  two  high  officials.  In  prac- 
tice, however,  that  line  has  been  well  demarcated, 


24 


CHAP.  I. 

The  prefects 

as  mayors  in 

colleague. 


Functions  of 

the  police 

prefect. 


Relation  of 

prefects  to 

council. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

and  each  understands  where  his  own  responsibility 
ends  and  that  of  his  colleague  begins.  In  case  of 
any  actual  disagreement,  the  disputed  question  is  re- 
ferred to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior,  whose  decision 
settles  the  immediate  issue  and  also  forms  a  prece- 
dent. It  would  be  entirely  possible  to  make  the 
prefect  of  police  a  great  bureau  chief  subject  to 
the  prefect  of  the  Seine  as  his  superior;  but,  with 
the  general  government  near  at  hand  to  reconcile 
all  differences,  the  plan  of  a  dual  mayoralty  does 
not  work  badly  in  practice.  It  grows,  moreover,  out 
of  very  ancient  Parisian  customs.  In  general,  the 
prefect  of  the  Seine  has  control  of  most  of  the  great 
regular  departments  of  municipal  administration; 
while  the  prefect  of  police,  although  some  of  his 
functions  have  from  time  to  time  been  transferred 
to  his  colleague,  retains  control  over  the  ordinary 
police  administration,  is  the  strong  right  arm  of 
criminal  justice,  and  has  charge  of  various  services 
relating  to  the  safety  and  convenience  of  traffic  in 
the  streets,  the  protection  of  life  and  property,  the 
enforcement  of  sanitary  regulations,  and  several 
kindred  matters. 

The  municipal  council  elects  its  own  president 
and  has  its  own  interior  organization  for  its  work. 
The  two  prefects  have  the  right  of  the  floor  in  all 
meetings  of  the  municipal  council,  and  may  always 
demand  a  hearing.  They  may  also  bring  with  them 
their  important  assistants  and  heads  of  working  de- 
partments. The  prefects,  with  the  aid  of  their  bureau- 
cracy of  subordinate  executive  officials,  make  up  the 
provisional  budgets,  and  assist  in  the  discussion  of 
all  financial  questions  in  the  sessions  of  the  muni- 
cipal council.  As  regards  parts  of  the  budget,  in- 
cluding the  police  estimates,  the  law  requires  that 
the  council  vote  the  sums  asked. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  25 

Inasmuch  as  French  cabinets  rise  and  fall  with  CHAP.  i. 
proverbial  frequency,  there  is  the  constant  possibility 

of  a  change  in  the  offices  of  the  two  prefects  who  T^^^ 

administer  Paris.    Naturally  the  government  of  the  toapenon- 

nel  of  gov- 

day  would  wish  to  be  certain  of  the  loyalty  to  itself  eminent. 
of  the  great  administrative  heads  of  the  capital  city. 
With  the  complete  renewal  of  the  entire  municipal 
council  every  three  years  under  a  system  of  univer- 
sal suffrage,  and  with  eighty  small  districts  electing 
each  a  single  member,  there  is  always  practical  cer- 
tainty of  a  considerable  number  of  new  councilors. 
There  are  numerous  quarters,  it  is  true,  that  have 
reflected  their  councilor  for  several  successive  terms; 
nevertheless,  no  one  can  deny  the  palpable  fact  that 
the  municipal  council  of  Paris  is  a  radical  rather 
than  a  conservative  body,  and  that,  while  possessing 
a  good  average  of  intelligence  and  personal  character, 
its  tendency  is  towards  doctrinaire  innovations. 

Over  against  this  rather  strenuous  and  high-keyed 
chamber  of  eighty  councilors  —  who  certainly  have 
much  less  of  bourgeois  caution  and  of  instinctive 
respect  for  the  large  taxpayer  than  corresponding 
municipal  councils  in  England  and  Germany  —  the 
observer  finds  a  great  administrative  organization 
completely  in  the  hands  of  a  government  prefect* 
supplemented  by  a  colleague  of  like  rank  who  exer- 
cises police  jurisdiction.  When,  as  a  foreign  in- 
quirer, I  have  sought  to  learn  whether  the  prefect  or  or  council 
the  council  really  dominated  Paris,  I  have  found  uate? 
much  conflict  of  opinion.  The  majority  of  the  mu- 
nicipal council  themselves,  together  with  the  host  of 
advanced  Parisian  radicals  and  the  growing  army 
of  socialists,  declare  that  the  prefect  is  dominant,  and 
that  Paris  is  thereby  deprived  of  its  appropriate 
measure  of  municipal  self-rule.  They  demand  an 
organization  like  that  of  any  other  French  city, 


26 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Depends 

upon  the 

point  of 

view. 


Harmony  of 
motive. 


Council  sub- 
ject to  little 
undue  in- 
fluence. 


whereby  the  mayor  and  the  executive  government 
may  be  evolved  out  of  the  bosom  of  the  popularly 
chosen  municipal  council.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
prefects  themselves,  and  the  great  majority  of  those 
citizens  who  call  themselves  conservative  and  mod- 
erate in  their  political  views,  declare  that  through 
its  hold  upon  the  purse-strings  the  municipal  coun- 
cil exercises  a  sufficiently  dominating  local  control 
over  administration,  and  that  the  constant  presence 
of  the  prefect  on  the  floor  of  the  municipal  chamber, 
where  he  is  subjected  to  the  full  moral  influence  of 
every  debate,  brings  him  into  such  intimate  and  vital 
relationships  with  the  representatives  of  the  citizens 
that  the  average  result  is  not  discordant. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  French  cabinet 
is  the  creature  of  the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  that  the 
chamber  itself  is  keenly  sensitive  to  the  influence  of 
Parisian  public  opinion,  and  that  all  political  ele- 
ments and  interests  are  in  general  agreement  upon 
the  proposition  that  the  splendor  of  Paris  must  be 
maintained  and  increased,  and  that  its  municipal  ser- 
vices must  be  conducted  with  the  highest  attainable 
degree  of  administrative  probity,  efficiency,  and  tech- 
nical skill.  The  municipal  council,  certainly,  cannot 
be  accused  of  any  apathy  with  regard  to  the  munici- 
pal aggrandizement  of  Paris.  Being  relieved  of  all 
direct  responsibility  for  the  actual  handling  of  the 
public  revenues,  the  councilors  are  subject  to  com- 
paratively slight  temptation.  They  have  no  contracts 
to  let,  no  departmental  offices  at  their  disposal,  and 
in  short  the  least  possible  chance  to  use  their  power 
for  private  gain.  But,  with  a  natural  jealousy  of  the 
prefect,  who  is  not  of  their  own  creation,  and  who  is 
not  directly  accountable  to  them,  they  are  at  liberty 
to  watch  his  administration  with  the  utmost  keen- 
ness. In  the  exercise  of  their  control  over  the  bud- 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


27 


get,  they  are  naturally  eager  to  scrutinize  all  expend!- 
tures,  with  no  motive  for  passing  over  anything  that 
could  be  deemed  questionable. 

On  the  other  hand  the  ministry  of  the  day,  con- 
scious of  the  precariousness  of  its  tenure  and  aware 
that  any  detected  unfaithfulness  on  the  part  of 
its  important  agent  the  prefect  of  the  Seine  might 
easily  cause  its  own  downfall,  has  every  motive  for 
keeping  in  that  important  post,  as  well  as  in  the  cor- 
responding post  of  police  prefect,  a  man  of  tried 
and  approved  personal  character  and  administrative 
efficiency.  Thus  the  existing  system,  which  involves 

,  ,  .    . 

a  certain  measure  of  rivalry  between  the  municipal 
council  on  the  one  hand  and  the  prefect's  executive 
organization  on  the  other,  does  not  of  necessity  dissi- 
pate responsibility.  In  this  particular  instance,  in- 
deed, it  appears  to  stimulate  good  behavior  on  the  part 
of  both.  The  council  has  the  more  time  to  consider 
and  debate  general  questions  of  municipal  improve- 
ment, and  to  scrutinize  every  phase  of  the  adminis- 
trative government,  while  the  prefect  on  his  part 
must  endeavor  at  once  to  satisfy  the  requirements  of 
the  general  government  and  to  maintain  a  good  modus 
vivendi  with  the  municipal  council. 

But  the  most  essential  factor  in  the  municipal  life 
of  Paris  is  not  the  prefect  who  wields  the  executive 
authority,  or  the  municipal  council  with  its  power  to 
control  policies  and  to  pass  upon  the  details  of  a  mi- 
nutely analyzed  financial  budget.  There  can  be  no 
comprehension,  however  faint,  of  the  government  of 
Paris  which  does  not  take  into  account  the  superb 
permanent  organization  of  the  civil-service  machine. 
It  is  to  this  tertium  quid  that  one  must  look  if  he 
would  discover  the  real  unity  and  continuity  of  the 
administrative  work  of  the  Paris  municipality.  Pre- 
fects may  come  and  go,  ministries  may  change  with 


CHAP.  i. 


Goodbe. 


rivalry  of 

zeal  for 

Paris. 


The  civil- 


28  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  the  seasons,  and  municipal  councils  may  debate  and 
harangue  until  they  make  the  doings  at  the  Hotel  de 
Ville  a  byword  for  futile  and  noisy  discussion.  But 
the  splendid  administrative  machine  moves  steadily 
on.  Herein  lies  the  explanation  of  much  that  puzzles 
many  foreign  observers,  who  cannot  understand  how 
to  reconcile  the  seemingly  perfect  system  of  French 
administration  in  all  matters  of  practical  detail  with 
the  rapid  and  capricious  changes  in  the  highest  ex- 
ecutive posts. 

The  administrative  machinery  of  Paris  is  complex 

but  unified.     At  the  head  are  the  offices   of    the 

two  prefects,  highly  elaborated  with   divisions  and 

nentadmin-   bureaus  for  the  oversight  of  each  main  department 

machine,  of  the  executive  system.  Thus  there  is  a  department 
of  records  and  accounts  methodically  and  perfectly 
organized;  the  municipal  finances  have  their  expert 
and  permanent  machinery;  the  assessment  and  col- 
lection of  taxes,  the  management  of  the  octrois,  all 
come  under  the  control  of  permanent  bureaus.  The 
public  works  of  Paris  are  carried  out  under  the 
supervision  of  a  director  of  public  works  (Dlrecteur 
des  Travaux  de  Paris),  who  is  aided  by  a  splendid  ser- 
vice of  architects  and  engineers,  and  whose  depart- 
ment is  subdivided  into  various  bureaus,  and  con- 
ducted with  all  that  talent  for  method  and  system  in 
these  matters  which  the  French  have  shown  them- 
selves to  possess  in  so  high  a  degree.  Public  instruc- 
tion is  organized  on  similar  lines  of  thoroughness 
and  permanence.  And  the  same  thing  may  be  said  of 
all  the  other  departments  which  belong  to  the  prefect 
of  the  Seine.  The  prefect  of  police  has  under  him, 
in  like  manner,  a  system  minutely  organized  from 
top  to  bottom. 

While  the  prefect  for  the  time  being  stands  at  the 
head  of  the  great  administrative  structure,  it  in  no 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY  29 

sense  belongs  to  him.  Nor  does  it  belong  to  the  mu-  CHAP.  i. 
nicipal  council;  for  councils  come  and  go  almost  as 
rapidly  as  prefects  and  cabinets.  It  belongs  rather 
to  the  community  and  the  country.  This  wonderful 
machine,  which  includes  policemen,  firemen,  school- 
teachers, street-cleaners,  bookkeepers,  civil  engineers, 
architects,  and  even  artists,  is  altogether  out  of  politics.  Inj? eP??l?en1t 
France  might  to-morrow  accept  the  sway  of  a  mill-  change. 
tary  dictator;  but  this  need  not  involve  a  single 
change  in  the  personnel  of  the  tens  of  thousands  of 
men  who  make  up  the  administrative  organization  of 
Paris,  with  the  bare  exception  of  the  two  prefects. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  most  extreme  of  the  Parisian 
socialists  and  communists  might  have  their  way,  and 
the  result  would  be  a  single  mayor  elected  by  the 
municipal  council  to  replace  the  two  prefects.  But 
otherwise  there  would  be  no  occasion  for  any  changes 
in  the  administrative  machine,  except  by  way  of  en- 
largement on  account  of  the  increased  range  of  direct 
municipal  undertakings  which  would  soon  follow  the 
triumph  of  the  radical  contingent. 

As  matters  now  stand,  every  element  in  the  national 
political  life  that  centers  at  the  capital,  and  every 
party  or  group  in  the  municipal  council  or  in  the  citi- 

,  .  „    .,  ,  -i    •     .  ,    •  •         The  common 

zenship  of  the  town,  has  an  equal  interest  in  mam-  interest  m  a 
taining  a  perfect  administrative  system  for  Paris. 
There  may  be  much  strife  and  contention  for  the 
privilege  of  dominating  that  machine ;  but  there  can 
be  no  wish  in  any  important  quarter  that  the  machine 
should  be  otherwise  than  admirable  and  efficient.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten  that  a  similar  permanency  be- 
longs to  the  organization  of  the  departments  of  the 
French  general  government.  Thus,  when  Parisian 
municipal  affairs  are  referred  for  decision  or  for  in- 
dorsement to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior,  it  is  proba- 
bly not  the  minister  himself  in  nineteen  cases  out  of 


30 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


But  it  is 

equal  to  its 

tasks. 


CHAP.  i.  twenty  who  passes  upon  them,  but  the  permanent 
bureau  officials  to  which  such  appeals  are  always  re- 
ferred, and  who  have  had  vast  experience  in  dealing 
with  them. 

The  administrative  organization  of  Paris  cannot,  of 
it  has  some   course,  be  wholly  free  from  the  faults  that  pertain 

inevitable  '  J  ^ 

faults.  everywhere  to  such  systems.  Bureaucratic  methods, 
supernumerary  officials,  mechanical  and  perfunctory 
service,  insidious  abuses  here,  petty  favoritisms  there, 
all  mar  the  ideal  perfection  of  the  structure.  But 
when  this  is  said,  it  remains  true  that  the  execution 
of  the  varied  municipal  business  of  the  French  me- 
tropolis is  in  the  hands  of  a  marvelously  well-trained 
and  faithful  body  of  public  servants,  through  whom 
the  general  government  by  its  prefect  on  the  one 
hand,  and  the  municipal  council  on  the  other,  can 
carry  out  most  satisfactorily  whatever  lines  of  policy 
may  be  determined  upon.  If  the  water  supply  is  to  be 
extended,  if  public  buildings  are  to  be  erected,  if  new 
bridges  are  to  be  constructed,  if  a  new  boulevard  is 
authorized, —  it  matters  not  whether  the  public  work 
be  ordered  and  paid  for  by  the  general  government, 
by  the  municipal  council,  or  by  contributions  from 
both  treasuries, — in  any  case  the  execution  of  the 
project  is  committed  to  the  prefect,  who  in  turn  assigns 
it  to  the  director  of  public  works,  at  whose  command 
is  a  highly  specialized  working  organization,  equal  — 
to  make  the  highest  American  comparison  —  to  the 
engineer  corps  of  the  war  department,  or  to  the  con- 
struction bureau  of  the  naval  department. 

Nor  must  it  be  understood  for  a  moment  that  this 
tertium  quid,  this  permanent  administrative  organi- 
zation,  is  merely  passive  and  obedient.  As  a  practi- 
cal matter  of  fact,  it  is  full  of  men  of  genius  and  en- 
thusiasm, zealous  for  the  advancement  of  Paris  along 
the  lines  of  their  own  special  departments  of  admin- 


the  public 
service. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEKN  CITY  31 

istration.  These  men  have  abundant  opportunity  to  CHAP.  i. 
present  their  views  to  the  prefect  and,  in  one  way  or 
in  another,  to  the  municipal  council.  Thus,  for  ex- 
ample, if  one  should  propose  to  assign  individual 
credit  for  the  modern  transformation  of  Paris,  it 
would  be  as  necessary  to  recognize  the  immense  value 
of  the  labors  of  the  late  director  of  public  works.  M.  „ 

*  The  director 

Alphand,  for  the  period  since  the  Franco-German  war     of  public 

works  as  an 

as  to  recognize  the  influence  and  energy  of  Baron  instance. 
Haussmann  as  prefect  of  the  Seine  in  the  preced- 
ing period.  I  have  already  spoken  of  M.  Alphand's 
career  as  director  of  public  works  for  some  twenty 
years.  He  filled  that  post  with  a  supreme  devo- 
tion and  ability,  and  with  untiring  solicitude  for 
the  adornment  of  Paris,  the  perfection  of  its  public 
services,  and  the  honesty  and  good  quality  of  its  en- 
gineering and  architectural  constructions,  whether 
below  the  street  surface  or  above.  And  what  has 
been  said  of  the  high  credit  due  to  this  distinguished 
public  servant  might  also  be  said  of  men  who  have 
occupied  themselves  with  the  development  of  the 
magnificent  school  facilities  of  Paris,  or  with  other 
departments  of  municipal  life. 

The  popular  educational  system  of  Paris,  with  its 
almost  unrivaled  adaptation  to  the  demands  of  real  life,  as  feeders°of 
furnishes  a  constant  stream  of  suitable  applicants  for  service.1 
places  in  the  lower  grades  of  the  various  municipal 
and  civil  services.  All  admissions  are  based  upon  ap- 
propriate and  impartial  examinations.  Promotions 
are  made  upon  approved  principles  from  within  the 
ranks.  The  system  is  not  so  mechanical  as  to  pre- 
clude the  recognition  of  special  talent,  but  it  affords 
scant  opportunity  for  injustice  or  favoritism.  The 
higher  grades  and  branches  of  the  public  service  draw 
upon  the  splendid  series  of  municipal  and  national 
technical  and  professional  schools,  which  train  men 


32 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Retirement 

pensions 

throughout 

the  system. 


Permanence 
of  the  arron- 

dissement 
lines. 


for  every  special  department  of  municipal  activity. 
Removals  from  the  service  are  not  made  upon  arbi- 
trary grounds.  Political  considerations  have  nothing 
to  do  with  municipal  employment.  Faithful  continu- 
ance in  the  service  is  rewarded  ultimately  by  retire- 
ment on  life  pensions.  There  is  every  incentive  to 
fidelity.  The  red  tape  and  circumlocutions  of  so  elabo- 
rate an  administrative  system  are  only  minor  objec- 
tions. Where  the  work  to  be  performed  is  so  enormous 
in  its  dimensions,  and  so  varied  in  its  details,  no  sys- 
tem less  firmly  coordinated,  and  less  perfectly  elabo- 
rated, could  in  the  long  run  produce  efficient  results. 
The  twenty  arrondissemen  ts  of  Paris  are  not  bounded 
by  temporary  lines,  nor  are  they  mere  electoral  divi- 
sions like  American  city  wards,  or  units  of  represen- 
tation like  our  congressional  and  legislative  districts. 
They  are  not  subject  to  rearrangement  in  order  to 
equalize  their  population.  Some  are  much  more  pop- 
ulous than  others,  and  the  municipal  council,  there- 
fore, with  its  four  members  from  each  arrondissement, 
does  not  represent  the  population  with  mathematical 
equality.  But  it  will  be  found  by  far  more  convenient 
to  assign  additional  members  to  the  more  populous 
arrondissements  than  to  recast  the  lines  in  order  to 
create  districts  of  equal  population.  The  arrondisse- 
ments are  designated  by  numbers  from  one  up  to 
twenty ;  but  they  are  also  named,  and  the  names  are 
suggestive  of  much  neighborhood  history  and  local 
tradition.1  Inasmuch  as  the  centralizing  administra- 

1  The  twenty  arrondissements  of  Paris  bear  the  following 


designations : 

I.  Louvre. 
II.  Bourse. 

III.  Temple. 

IV.  H6tel-de-Ville. 

V.  Panthfeon. 
VI.  Luxembourg. 

VII.  Palais-Bourbon. 


VHL  tilysfce.  XIV. 

IX.  Opera.  XV. 

X.  Enclos  Saint-     XVI. 

Laurent.  XVII. 

XL  Popincourt.     XVIII. 

XII.  Reuilly.  XIX. 

XIII.  Gobelins.  XX. 


Observatoire. 
Vaugirard. 


Batignollea. 
Butte-Montmartre. 
Buftes-Chaumont. 
Menilmontant. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  33 

tive  tendency  is  so  exceedingly  strong  in  Paris,  it  is  CHAP.  i. 
highly  fortunate  in  every-day  practice  that  the  twenty 
arrondissements  should  have  gained  each  its  own  sense 
of  permanent  neighborhood  identity.  It  is  true  that 
the  people  of  the  arrondissement  have  no  local  elective 
body.  Nevertheless,  there  is  a  neighborhood  life  that 

*  .  .    .  Neighbor- 

Centers  in  the  commodious  mairie  building  of  each  ar-     h°°d  »fe 

rondissement.  These  twenty  divisions  make  it  easy  themairies. 
to  distribute  and  apportion  the  numerous  administra- 
tive tasks  that  bring  the  government  into  contact  with 
the  people.  Thus  the  arrondissement  becomes  the 
ready  and  natural  unit  for  the  administration  of  the 
school  system.  Moreover,  instead  of  dealing  with  the 
central  authorities  of  the  prefecture  at  the  H6tel  de 
Ville,  the  people  have  only  to  go  to  the  familiar  mai- 

J  How  the 

rie  of  their  own  arrondissement  to  report  births  and  arrondisse- 
deaths,  and  to  conform  with  all  the  rules  and  regu-  government 
lations  touching  the  record  of  vital  statistics.  It  is  people. 
here,  as  I  have  already  remarked,  that  the  civil  cere- 
mony of  marriage  is  performed  by  the  maire  of  the 
arrondissement.  Here  the  registration  of  voters  is 
made  and  kept,  election  arrangements  are  made, 
and  jury  lists  are  selected.  It  is  here,  also,  that  the 
youths  of  the  arrondissement  are  registered  for  pur- 
poses of  military  obligation.  From  the  mairie  of 
the  arrondissemeut  proceed  the  assessment  and  col- 
lection of  all  taxes.  For  minor  licenses  and  privi- 
leges it  is  sufficient  to  make  application  at  one's  own 
mairie.  Through  this  agency  the  wonderful  popular 
loans  of  the  municipality  and  of  the  state  reach  the 
small  investors  of  Paris.  The  mairies  form  ideal  li-  Themairies 

as  social 

brary  centers,  and  they  contain  the  reading-rooms  and     centers. 
the  branch  reference  and  circulating  libraries  of  the 
municipality.     Obviously,  the  arrondissement  forms 
the  local  center  for  all  work  of  public  relief  and  charity. 
It  will  be  found  to  contain  its  local  branches  of  the 


31  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  municipal  savings-bank  system,  and  also  its  branch  of 
the  mont-de-piete — the  great  municipal  loan  agency, 
or  pawnbroking  shop. 

Thus  the  arrondissement  of  Paris  is  the  local  ad- 
ministrative unit.  It  is  the  institutions  thus  cen- 
tered in  the  twenty  districts  that  come  into  contact 
with  the  daily  life  of  the  people.  The  maire  and 
his  three  adjuncts  are  appointees  of  the  central  pre- 
fecture, and  are  regarded  as  the  prefect's  local  agents. 
But  they  are  not  capriciously  removed  or  shifted 

influence  of   about,  and  they  grow  into  the  exercise  of  a  very 

^facial"6  strong  neighborhood  influence  and  authority,  with 
every  motive  for  faithfulness  to  the  welfare  of  the 
people  with  whose  affairs,  from  the  cradle  to  the 
grave,  they  are  so  intimately  associated.  With  no 
conscious  interchange  of  ideas  or  methods,  the  best 
administrative  minds  of  London  and  Paris  have  come 

The "  sub-  to  a  similar  conclusion  touching  the  principle  of  what 
idea  iii  I  have  elsewhere  called  "  sub-municipalities,"  as  local 
centers  for  a  very  large  part  of  the  practical  govern- 
ing business  of  a  great  metropolis.  In  London  it 
is  now  proposed1  to  give  a  mayor  and  an  elective 
council  to  each  one  of  these  sub-municipalities,  and 
to  confer  upon  them  —  under  the  control  and  super- 
vision of  a  great  central  council  and  mayoralty  — 
a  very  considerable  range  of  executive  work  and  au- 
thority. The  genius  of  the  Paris  system  is  different. 
All  discretionary  authority  and  all  deliberative  func- 
tions belong  to  the  government  of  the  metropolis  as 
a  whole.  But  the  carrying  out  of  as  large  an  amount 
as  possible  of  the  executive  work  is  assigned  to  the 
agencies  or  bureaus  which  the  central  authorities 
have  established  in  each  one  of  the  sub-municipali- 

1  See  report  of  Royal  Commission  on  London  Unification,  as 
discussed  in  my  volume  on  "Municipal  Government  in  Great 
Britain,"  pp.  257-62.  See  also  Appendix  III  of  same  volume. 


London  and 
Paris. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  35 

ties.  The  title  of  maire,  conferred  upon  the  chief  CHAP.  i. 
functionary  at  the  mairie  building  of  every  arron- 
dissement,  is  well  calculated  to  emphasize  the  dignity 
and  permanence  of  the  neighborhood  regime,  and  the 
lasting  identity  of  the  arrondissement's  territorial 
bounds. 

Upon  no  Parisian  topic  does  the  foreign  questioner 
encounter  opinions  more  diametrically  opposed  to 
each  other  than  upon  that  of  the  police  administra-  The  police— 
tion.  In  the  scheme  of  Lacroix  and  his  colleagues,  vertedtopic. 
to  which  I  have  made  reference  as  fairly  typifying 
the  perennial  projects  of  the  Parisian  radicals,  it  was 
proposed  that  the  so-called  odious  prefecture  of  po- 
lice should  be  abolished  altogether,  and  that  the 
police  authority  should  be  invested  in  the  mayor  and 
municipal  council  in  accordance  with  the  Parisian 
constitution  of  1790,  as  also  briefly  revived  in  1848. 
The  prefecture  of  police  for  the  department  of  the 
Seine  has  been  described  as  the  masterpiece  of  Bona- 
parte's administrative  system.  It  was  reconstituted 
-in  1853  by  Louis  Napoleon  as  an  indispensable  part 
of  his  centralized  government ;  and  the  third  repub-  poHceepre- 
lic  —  which  clung  tenaciously  to  the  principle  of  cen-  maintained. 
tralized  administration,  although  willing  to  grant 
much  to  localities  on  the  side  of  elective  councils  — 
retained  the  police  prefect  for  the  metropolis  and  its 
environing  department  of  the  Seine,  continuing  to 
employ  him  as  the  direct  agent  of  the  general 
government. 

The  functions  of  this  police  prefect  are  varied  and 
extensive.     He  controls  not  only  the  ordinary  police 
that  patrol  the  streets  and  keep  order,  but  also  the  Functions  of 
detectives  and  officers  who  constitute  the  "police   department. 
judiciaire,"  and  who  work  up  criminal  cases.     Be- 
sides these,  he  is  master  of  the  political  police, — 


36 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


A  censor 
with  vast 
authority. 


The  police 
prefect  as 
viewed  by 
his  critics. 


the  government's  secret  agents, —  and  he  has  in  his 
hand  a  secret-service  fund  to  spend  unaccountably 
except  as  regards  his  immediate  superior,  the  Minister 
of  the  Interior.  His  department  covers  the  main- 
tenance of  order  everywhere  in  streets  and  public 
places,  the  punishment  of  misdemeanors,  the  inspec- 
tion of  weights  and  measures,  the  organization  of 
important  life-saving  and  sanitary  services,  authority 
to  permit  or  to  forbid  public  spectacles,  licenses  of 
numerous  sorts, —  such  as  omnibuses  and  cabs  and 
river  steamers, —  the  regulation  of  certain  trades 
and  callings,  and,  in  general,  the  control  of  a  num- 
ber of  services  that  affect  the  security  of  life  and 
property,  the  public  health,  and  the  convenience  of 
a  great  community.  It  belongs  to  his  functions  to 
know  who  comes  and  goes,  what  persons  are  regis- 
tered in  the  hotels  and  boarding-houses,  what  meet- 
ings are  held,  what  public  utterances  are  made,  what 
things  are  said  in  print.  In  Paris,  naturally,  every 
form  of  offense  against  the  laws,  from  anarchist  plots 
to  common  swindling,  finds  its  center  so  far  as  France 
is  concerned.  And  the  whole  tendency  of  the  century 
has  been  to  strengthen  rather  than  to  weaken  the 
concentrated  authority  of  the  police  prefect  at  Paris, 
for  the  prevention  and  detection  of  crime,  and  to 
hold  in  check  the  elements  of  social  disorder. 

The  municipal  autonomists  have  been  accustomed 
to  declare  that  the  police  prefect  is  at  once  the  most 
unaccountable  and  the  most  powerful  man  in  France. 
They  make  the  charge  that  in  all  this  varied  array  of 
business  he  has  practically  to  please  nobody  besides 
himself.  They  place  much  emphasis  upon  the  fact 
that  when  his  annual  budget — which  is  distinct  from 
the  budget  of  his  colleague  the  prefect  of  the  Seine  — 
goes  to  the  municipal  council,  the  law  makes  it  obli- 
gatory upon  that  body  to  allow  it  in  sum  total,  ap- 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  37 

propriating  the  funds  demanded  without  subtraction  CHAP.  i. 
at  any  point.  They  assert,  moreover,  that  he  is  in 
fact  held  accountable  nowhere  for  the  expenditure  of 
the  vast  sum  that  he  draws  from  the  municipal  trea- 
sury every  year.  To  continue  the  argument  in  the 
vein  of  these  opponents  of  the  police  prefect,  his 
function  is  declared  to  be  one  of  darkness  and  mys- 
tery, a  fit  creation  of  such  rulers  as  the  Napoleons, 
but  with  no  proper  place  in  a  republican  form  of 
government.  Engaged  as  he  must  be  in  the  secret 
service  of  politics,  promoting  the  aims  and  ends  of 
the  men  who  for  the  day  hold  the  reins  of  national 
power,  he  is  not  the  suitable  person,  we  are  told,  to 
administer  the  ordinary  police  government  of  a  city. 
This  controverted  subject  has,  however,  another 
and  a  very  different  mode  of  approach.  According 
to  the  French  theory,  the  police  power  of  the  state  is 
divisible  only  for  purposes  of  administrative  conven-  T^  French 

^  r       r  .  theory  of  po- 

lence.  The  prefects  of  the  eighty-seven  departments  »ce  power, 
of  France  are  the  direct,  appointed  agents  of  the  cen- 
tral government ;  and  each  is  in  exercise  of  a  general 
police  supervision  over  his  region.  The  departments 
are  divided  into  arrondissements,  in  each  of  which  a 
sub-prefect  is  stationed,  who  in  turn  exercises  a  more 
minute  supervision  over  the  police  affairs  of  his  smaller 
territory.  The  primary  divisions  are  the  communes 
and  municipalities ;  and  in  them  it  is  true  that  the 
ordinary  police  authority  has  been  committed  to  the 
mayor  and  municipal  officers.  But  every  French 
mayor  is  regarded  as  at  once  an  agent  of  the  state 
and  the  chief  executive  officer  of  his  town.  It  is  in 
his  capacity  as  an  agent  of  the  state  that  he  exercises 
police  authority.  Now,  returning  to  Paris,  the  friends 
of  the  present  system  would  explain  that  even  if  Paris 
had  its  own  popularly  chosen  mayor,  with  police  au- 
thority invested  in  him  and  his  assistants,  the  French 

3* 


38  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  system  as  a  whole  would  make  it  necessary  that  a 
departmental  prefect  representing  the  state  should 
exercise  a  large  contingent  measure  of  supervisory 
authority  over  his  conduct,  particularly  as  regards 
matters  of  police.  But  inasmuch  as  all  the  political 
Reasons  for  and  judicial  mechanisms  of  the  French  nation  find  their 

direct  con-  " 

troi  at  Paris,  central  embodiment  within  the  compact  territorial 
limits  of  Paris,  the  national  authorities  of  necessity 
have  a  paramount  interest  in  the  maintenance  of  a 
trustworthy  local  police  service.  So  inextricably,  it 
is  held,  are  national  and  local  interests  blended,  and 
so  indispensable  is  the  requirement  of  a  perfect  under- 
standing and  an  unbroken  harmony  between  the  gen- 
eral machine  of  national  administration  and  the  local 
machine  of  Parisian  administration,  that  the  simplest 
solution  lies  in  the  direct,  prefectoral  government  of 
Paris,  without  the  intervention  of  any  such  citizens' 
representative  as  a  mayor. 

The  municipal  council,  it  is  true,  must  vote  to  the 
prefect  of  police  the  whole  sum  that  he  demands.  But 
it  is  not  compelled  to  act  blindly.  The  prefect  brings 
in  to  the  council  a  very  elaborate  printed  budget,  in 
which  he  sets  forth  with  much  detail  his  itemized 

The  police 

budget,  estimates  for  the  coming  year,  comparing  the  esti- 
mates with  the  corresponding  items  for  the  year  that 
is  current.  The  council  is  in  a  position  to  acquaint 
itself  with  all  that  is  being  done,  and  is  able,  in  point 
of  fact,  to  secure  the  enlargement  or  the  modification 
of  the  prefect's  policy  at  various  points.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  police  policies  and  expenditures  are  subject 
to  the  Ministry  of  the  Interior,  which  is  so  organized 
that  permanent  and  expert  officials  are  able  to  hold 
the  prefect  to  a  severe  accounting.  Still  further,  the 
municipal  council,  which  is  compelled  to  vote  the  tax- 
payers' money  for  a  police  establishment  that  it  does 
not  control,  may  always  find  some  solace  in  the  fact 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY  39 

that  the  general  government  pays  something  for  its     CHAP.  i. 
retention  of  police  authority.    The  annual  subvention 

*       .  Police  sub- 

Out  of  the  national  treasury  toward  the  police  of      vention 

.  *  from  nation- 

Fans  amounts  to  more  than  ten  million  francs  a  year,    ai  treasury. 

or  in  round  figures  to  one  third  of  the  entire  budget 
of  the  police  prefecture,  and  to  nearly  or  quite  one 
half  of  the  cost  of  the  police  service  strictly  speaking. 
So  long  as  the  police  system  is  reasonably  efficient, 
the  citizens  of  Paris  might  well  prefer  national  con- 
trol with  the  national  subvention,  rather  than  the 
more  or  less  empty  privilege  of  municipal  control 
with  the  whole  bill  payable  out  of  the  municipal 
treasury. 

The  prejudice  against  the  police  prefecture  is  to  a 
large  extent  traditional.     Under  arbitrary  Napoleonic 

I      •*   •  j        j-       ,1    i,          AT.  v  Additional 

rule  it  is  easy  to  understand  how  the  police  system  prejudice. 
could  have  been  used  as  an  instrument  of  oppression 
and  tyranny.  Theoretically,  it  is  always  susceptible 
to  use  as  a  political  instrument.  But  under  republi- 
can institutions  there  exists  only  to  the  most  limited 
extent  either  the  motive  or  the  opportunity  to  employ 
the  police  power  for  any  other  than  legitimate  ends. 
No  minister  for  many  years  past  has  held  his  seat 
firmly  enough  to  attempt  any  seriously  objectionable 
use  of  the  Parisian  police  system  for  improper  politi- 
cal purposes.  The  dark  and  mysterious  police  power 
which  a  certain  type  of  French  novel  has  long  ex- 
ploited seems  to  be  quite  obsolete  in  Paris.  Neither 
the  Chamber  of  Deputies  nor  the  Senate  would  tol- 
erate the  police  system  as  it  exists  to-day,  with  its 
obligatory  budget,  if  it  were  not  in  fact  an  orderly 
and  efficient  system  manned  from  top  to  bottom  by  An  orderly 

•  .  '         and  excel- 

officers  who  have  entered  the  service  upon  examina-  lent  service. 
tion  -for  fitness  and  have  been  promoted  for  merit. 
The  ten  or  twelve  thousand  officials  who  are  upon  the 
pay-rolls  of  the  prefecture  of  police  constitute  a  body 


40  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  of  men  organized  as  methodically  as  an  army.  Nothing 
could  be  much  further  from  the  truth  than  to  assume 
that  the  great  power  vested  in  the  prefect  means  any 
looseness  or  corruption  in  the  ordinary  administration 
of  the  police  system.  The  peace  and  good  order  of 
the  metropolis  are  well  maintained;  the  courts  of 
justice  are  ably  served  by  that  portion  of  the  police 
system  which  makes  up  the  police  judiciaire;  and  the 
special  municipal  services  of  inspection  and  oversight 
committed  to  the  care  of  the  prefect  of  police  are  ad- 
mirably conducted.  The  fact  that  prefects,  though 
accountable  to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior,  nominally 
hold  their  commissions  of  appointment  from  the  Pres- 
ident of  the  Republic,  tends  to  give  both  the  prefect 
of  the  Seine  and  the  prefect  of  police  a  higher  degree 
of  stability  in  office  than  the  minister  himself,  who  is 
at  the  mercy  of  every  shifting  mood  of  the  Chamber. 
The  ordinary  or  municipal  police  service  of  Paris 
was  modeled  in  1854  upon  the  metropolitan  police 

Th6  T>ollC6 

force  as  or-  system  of  London.  At  that  time  there  were  in  all 
gaTs54. m  Paris  only  four  hundred  and  fifty  policemen  assigned 
to  patrol  work.  Three  hundred  other  members  of 
the  municipal  service  had  special  duties  to  perform. 
The  city  was  kept  in  hand  by  military  rather  than 
police  control.  Small  garrisons  of  soldiers  were  dis- 
tributed everywhere  throughout  the  metropolis.  The 
Emperor  wisely  determined  to  remove  most  of  these 
objectionable  squads  of  soldiery,  and  to  create  a  po- 
lice force  similar  to  that  of  London.  The  number 
of  ordinary  policemen  —  then  called  sergents  de  ville, 
and  afterward,  as  now,  entitled  gardiens  de  la  paix — 
was  at  once  multiplied  to  nearly  three  thousand. 
Under  the  police  prefect  was  appointed  a  chief  of 
the  municipal  police  service,  and  under  this  chief 
were  head  officers  for  each  arrondissement.  A  central 
post  or  police  station  was  established  in  each  arron- 


PARIS :  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


41 


Patrol 
system. 


dissement,  and  a  sub-station  in  each  quarter.  The  CHAP.  i. 
police  force  for  every  arroudissement  was  divided 
into  three  brigades,  and  each  of  these  was  further 
subdivided  into  four  sections  corresponding  to  the 
four  quarters  of  the  arrondissement.  The  three  bri- 
gades were  arranged  upon  the  principle  of  an  aver- 
age active  service  of  eight  hours  a  day  for  each  bri- 
gade and  for  each  individual  policeman.  Each  quar- 
ter was  further  subdivided  into  Hots,  or  beats,  and  it 
was  a  part  of  the  plan  to  assign  the  same  policeman 
always  to  the  same  beat,  in  order  that  he  might  know 
thoroughly  his  little  circumscription.  At  night  two 
policemen  were  to  make  their  rounds  in  company, 
and  thus  to  guard  two  adjoining  ilots.  From  time 
to  time  the  number  of  patrolmen  was  increased.  On 
the  extension  of  the  municipal  limits  in  1860,  the  po- 
lice force  was  fixed  at  4616  active  men.  The  number 
became  5768  in  1867.  After  the  war,  in  1871,  the 
military  regime  was  promptly  abandoned  in  favor  of 
a  reorganized  police  force  of  7756  men,  which  is  now 
nearer  9000.  There  has  been  no  material  alteration 
in  the  practical  workings  of  the  system.  Its  recogni- 
tion of  the  distinct  and  permanent  character  of  the 
arrondissements  and  of  the  quarters  as  local  divi- 
sions adds  much  to  its  value  to  the  citizens  on  the 
one  hand  and  to  the  higher  authorities  on  the  other. 
The  honesty  and  faithfulness  of  these  policemen  are 
matters  of  common  testimony.  The  discipline  of  the 
service  is  strict  and  the  duties  are  arduous,  while  the 
pay  is  exceedingly  modest.  Nevertheless,  there  are 
thirty  or  forty  candidates  for  every  vacancy;  and 
the  places  are  filled  with  young  men  who  must  be  Discipline  of 
at  least  twenty-one  years  old  while  not  more  than  new  men. 
thirty,  and  who  must  pass  thorough  examinations  to 
test  their  physical,  intellectual,  and  moral  fitness. 
Once  admitted  on  probation,  the  novitiate  is  Sub- 


Numerical 
strength  of 
the  force. 


42  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  L  jected  to  severe  training  for  a  number  of  months  be- 
fore he  is  allowed  to  appear  alone  in  uniform  as  a 
gardien  de  la  paix.  In  this  period  of  tutelage  he  has 
been  obliged  to  master  thoroughly  the  laws,  rules, 
and  regulations  that  affect  his  duties:  and  his  dis- 

The  period         .  1  ...  '    . 

of  tutelage,  cipline  includes  military  drill,  gymnastic  exercises, 
and  whatsoever  else  is  thought  likely  to  make  him  a 
more  valuable  public  servant.  He  is  taught  fidelity 
to  duty,  and  is  warned  that  to  take  the  smallest  bribe 
or  gift  may  cost  him  his  place  and  deprive  him  of  his 
prospect  of  a  pension.  After  twenty-five  years  of 
service,  he  may  retire  upon  a  pension  that  will  suffice 
to  keep  him  in  decency  for  the  rest  of  his  life. 

Such  a  police  system  as  I  have  thus  described  is 
familiar  enough,  as  regards  its  modus  operandi,  to 
the  denizens  of  all  large  English-speaking  communi- 
ties. I  am  inclined  to  believe,  however,  that  the 

en's  "long    Parisian  organization  identifies  the  individual  police- 
tenure  of  his  ,  J11          ',1  '•      1 

"beat."  man  more  permanently  and  closely  with  a  particular 
neighborhood  than  is  customary  in  any  American 
city,  and  that  there  is  some  advantage  in  this  fact 
so  long  as  the  gardien  de  la  paix  is  indeed  upright 
and  faithful,  terrorizing  evil-doers,  befriending  the 
unfortunate  and  helpless,  and  fulfilling  in  all  re- 
spects the  mission  which  his  title  implies. 

But  there  belongs  to  the  police  service  of  Paris 
another  localized  institution  which  is  at  once  peculiar 
and  highly  interesting.  I  refer  to  what  is  known  as 
The  ponce  the  commissariat.  In  every  quarter  of  Paris  there  is 
°MBy.  established  a  functionary  known  as  the  police  com- 
missary. He  is  a  man  of  legal  education  as  well  as 
of  experience  in  police  affairs.  He  exercises  an  au- 
thority which  would  suggest,  to  an  American  or  an 
Englishman,  now  a  justice  of  the  peace,  now  a  police 
judge,  now  a  coroner,  now  a  sheriff,  now  a  truant 
officer,  and  now  a  censor  of  public  morals.  The  com- 


PARIS:    THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  43 

missary's  office  is  said  to  be  a  survival  from  very  CHAP.  i. 
ancient  times,  when  his  lineal  antecedent  was  chosen 
by  the  people  of  each  parish  as  an  arbiter  in  neigh-  once  a 
borhood  affairs,  and  a  dispenser  of  ready  justice  in  hood8arwter. 
cases  of  petty  offense.  He  is  now  an  appointee  of 
the  government,  and  practically,  if  not  nominally,  a 
creature  of  the  police  prefect.  Nevertheless,  he  has 
the  presumption  of  stable  tenure,  and  is  appointed 
after  competitive  examinations  which  are  intended  to 
make  certain  his  fitness  for  the  peculiarly  discretion- 
ary business  that  comes  before  him.  Such  is  the 
sphere  of  his  tasks  that  he  contributes,  perhaps  more 
than  any  other  official,  to  the  bringing  of  government 
and  administration  home  to  the  people  in  their  very 
neighborhoods.  When  an  arrest  is  made  by  a  police- 
man he  must  proceed  at  once  with  his  prisoner  to  the 
nearest  commissary.  The  routine  work  of  the  com- 
missary's office  is  in  charge  of  a  secretary,  who  must 
be  an  intelligent  and  experienced  man,  and  who  is 
himself  in  the  line  of  promotion.  He  is  further  as- 
sisted by  several  inspectors,  who  are  ready  men  equal 
to  clerical  office  duties,  and  also  capable  of  such  out- 

r          .  Now  an  m- 

side  work  as  serving  papers  or  otherwise  represent-    tennediary 

*-,  between  the 

ing  their  chief,  the  commissary.     It  should  be  under-    ponce  and 
stood  that  the  commissary  is  not  a  judge  in  the  true      courts, 
sense,  and  that  his  function  in  cases  of  crime  or  mis- 
demeanor is  a  preliminary  one.     He  makes  inquiries, 
commits  to  a  place  of  detention,  and  makes  prompt 
and  full  report  to  the  central  offices  of  the  police  pre- 
fecture.    The  patrolman,  through  his  direct  superiors 
at  the  arrondissement  post,  also  makes  his  indepen- 
dent report,  and  the  case  is  thus  passed  along  to  the 
criminal  courts  to  be  dealt  with  in  accordance  with 
the  established  procedure.    It  is  easy  to  see  that  the 
resort  to  a  commissary,  which  is  prompt  and  impera-    Must  sane- 
tive,  is  at  once  a  safeguard  to  the  citizen  and  a  relief     "arcesttry 


44  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  L  to  the  patrolman  making  an  arrest.  A  commissary 
is  always  present  at  every  performance  in  every 
theater.  One  is  always  on  duty  at  the  Bourse,  and 

Uofther  several  others  are  specially  deputized  to  serve  the 
commissary,  public  convenience  at  points  where  men  are  wont  to 
gather  in  large  numbers.  Thus,  in  case  of  any  dis- 
order or  disturbance  the  policemen  on  duty  may  in- 
stantly bring  the  person  accused  of  an  offense  before 
a  functionary  whose  capacity  is  essentially  magis- 
terial. If  the  accused  person  is  to  be  detained  for 
trial,  it  will  be  upon  the  order  of  the  commissary, 
whose  business  it  becomes  to  prepare  the  complaint 
for  the  trial  judge.  The  relief  thus  afforded  to  the 
ordinary  policeman  is  obviously  of  a  kind  which  tends 
to  promote  rather  than  to  diminish  his  efficiency.  In 
matters  of  family  dispute,  and  in  petty  contentions 
of  many  kinds,  the  commissary  is  readily  accessible 
for  informal  services  that  make  him  an  invaluable 
promoter  of  the  neighborhood  well-being,  especially 
when  he  happens  to  add  common  sense  and  kind- 
heartedness  to  his  exercise  of  authority. 

Besides  the  local  or  arrondissement  service  of  the 

Other 

tranches  of  police,  there  are  a  number  of  central  brigades  assigned 

t)olic6  scr- 

vice.  to  duty  in  special  ways  —  to  markets,  parks,  and  pub- 
lic buildings,  to  oversight  of  cabs  and  carriages,  to 
inspection  of  lodging-houses,  to  various  inquiries  and 
investigations,  and  finally  to  detective  work.  More- 
over, the  indoor  organization  of  the  various  bureaus 
of  the  central  prefecture,  with  the  marvelous  system 
of  records  touching  the  personal  history  or  the  move- 
ments of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  people,  is  not  to  be 
forgotten.  As  an  administrative  structure,  the  police 
system  of  Paris  must  arouse  the  admiration  of  all  who 
study  it,  whether  they  approve  or  not  in  all  respects. 
The  so-called  Parisian  police  des  mceurs  is  entirely 
distinct,  in  its  organization  and  work,  from  the  patrol 
system  ;  and  apart  from  the  maintenance  of  a  state  of 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY  46 

good  order  and  decency  on  the  streets  and  in  public     CHAP.  i. 
places,  the  ordinary  policeman  of  Paris  is  not  con- 
cerned with  those  phases  of  the  life  of  great  cities 
which  have  in  American  cities  so  frequently  involved 
the  corruption  of  police  departments. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  the  differentiation  of  public 
services  and  functions,  as  municipal  life  attains  the 
higher  stages  of  development.    Thus,  one  by  one  great    ^°l^f 
municipal  departments  have  grown  out  of  what  were    payments. 
originally  the  mere  incidents  of  police  administration. 
One  of  these  incidents  was  street  lighting.    What  we 
call  health  administration  —  now  one  of  the  most  im- 
portant separate  departments  of  city  government  — 
was  everywhere  at  the  outset  a  very  subordinate  de- 
tail of  the  police  branch.    It  is  not  difficult  to  under- 

*  Public  light- 

Stand  how  the  illumination  of  streets  and  public  places     ing  origi- 

nally  a 

should  have  been  first  undertaken  rather  to  assist  the  police  meas- 
police  in  preventing  crime  and  disorder  than  to  pro- 
mote merely  the  convenience  of  the  citizens.  Under 
this  theory,  the  control  of  public  lighting  in  Paris  re- 
mained in  the  hands  of  the  prefect  of  police  until 
about  the  year  1860,  when  its  natural  evolution  had 
reached  such  a  stage  that  the  police  idea  had  been 
completely  outgrown.  It  was  then  transferred  to  the 
general  sphere  of  the  prefect  of  the  Seine,  and  to  the 
particular  management  of  the  director  of  public 
works,  in  whose  great  systematic  department  it  be-  Transferred 

..     ,.        ,     ,&  J       „  •  f  •  '  to  director 

came  coordinated  as  one  of  a  series  of  engineering     ofpubuc 
services.    The  immense  transformations  of  the  Hauss-     Wi8<io.m 
mann  period  had  fairly  begun,  and  a  new  era  had 
been  entered  upon  for  all  the  services  which,  like  that 
of  public  lighting,  bore  relationship  in  some  way  to 
the  street  system. 

Like  American  cities,  and  in  this  respect  wholly  un-  Gas  supplied 
like  those  of  England  and  Germany,  French  cities  companies. 
have  been  disposed  to  leave  the  manufacture  and  sale 


46  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  of  illutninants  to  private  companies.  But  the  resem- 
blance between  French  and  American  cities  as  regards 
their  dealings  with  this  important  service  ends  ab- 
ruptly with  the  simple  fact  that  they  have  chosen  to 
employ  private  instead  of  public  initiative.  Paris  in 
its  dealing  with  lighting  companies  has  always  fully 
guarded  the  interests  of  the  municipality  and  the  citi- 
zens. American  cities  have  been  slow  to  learn  the 
elementary  lesson  that  there  can  be  no  real  competi- 
tion between  gas  companies  in  the  same  area,  and  that 
it  is  altogether  futile  to  attempt  to  regulate  by  com- 
petition a  business  that  is  monopolistic  in  its  very  na- 
ture. Paris,  before  1850,  in  the  experimental  period 
of  public  gas-lighting,  had  seven  or  eight  different 
gas  companies.  But  each  was  restricted  to  its  own 
district ;  each  was  chartered  upon  terms  that  gave  the 
Municipal  city  authorities  large  control ;  each  furnished  its  quota 

"ipw  supply!  of  gas  for  street  lights  and  public  buildings  at  a  price 
fixed  by  charter  contract  and  approximating  actual 
cost  of  manufacture ;  each  paid  a  moderate  street  rental 
for  the  privilege  of  laying  pipes  under  the  sidewalks; 
each  accepted  a  scale  of  prices  for  private  consumers 
arranged,  by  agreement  with  the  city,  upon  the  basis 
of  reports  made  by  commissions  composed  of  scien- 
tific authorities  and  experts ;  each  submitted  to  a 
daily  official  examination  of  the  quality  of  its  gas  and 
to  penalties  for  failure  to  reach  the  standard,  and  each 
laid  its  pipes  in  its  respective  territory  under  strict 
regulations  respecting  injury  to  the  payment  and 
disturbance  of  traffic.  All  these  matters  involved 
very  much  discussion  and  no  small  difference  of  opin- 
ion ;  but  all  were  from  time  to  time  adjusted  in  an 
equitable  and  enlightened  way. 

The  six  companies  which  for  some  years  had  been 
Fusion  of     engaged  in  the  distribution  of  gas  to  Paris  were  fused 

gies  inTsss!"  into  one  great  company  in  1855.     Some  of  our  Amer- 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


47 


Suburban 

companies 

absorbed  in 

1861. 


lean  cities  have  in  recent  years  been  well-nigh  con-  CHAP.  i. 
vulsed  with  excitement  and  indignation  because  their 
local  gas  companies  had  been  consolidated  or  brought 
under  a  unitary  management.  And  yet  it  ought  to 
be  perfectly  obvious  that  a  consolidated  gas  supply 
can  be  more  economically  produced  and  sold.  The 
fusion  of  the  Paris  companies  in  1855  was  effected 
only  after  several  years  of  negotiations  between  the 
companies  and  the  government,  and  it  rested  upon  a 
basis  carefully  prescribed.  The  results  were  highly 
beneficial  to  all  parties  concerned.  In  1861  a  fusion 
was  accomplished  between  the  Parisian  gas  company 
and  the  smaller  companies  that  had  supplied  the  sub- 
urban districts,  Paris  having  meanwhile  annexed  the 
outer  belt  of  arrondissements  and  given  the  city  its 
present  area,  with  the  engirdling  fortifications  as  the 
municipal  limits. 

In  1870  the  charter  of  the  gas  company  was  renewed 
and  revised,  and  was  placed  upon  a  basis  that  still 
exists,  and  that  will  hold  good  until  1910.  The  con- 
tract might  have  been  studied  with  great  advantage  Terms  of  the 
in  this  country ;  and  even  now,  after  the  lapse  of  dec-  franchise, 
ades,  it  is  a  more  enlightened  and  satisfactory  ar- 
rangement than  any  that  has  been  made  by  large 
American  cities.  The  capitalization  of  the  company 
was  fixed  at  84,000,000  francs.  The  quality  of  the 
gas  and  the  method  of  testing  are  prescribed.  Pipes 
must  be  laid  each  year  wherever  the  public  authorities 
determine,  and  their  removal,  alteration,  replacement, 
etc.,  are  all  subject  to  the  order  of  the  authorities,  at 
the  expense  of  the  gas  company.  There  must  be  two 
lines  of  piping  along  each  street  that  is  fourteen  me- 
ters or  more  in  width,  and  along  each  street  that  is 
paved  with  asphalt,  no  matter  how  narrow.  It  is  ar- 
ranged that  the  company  shall  pay  the  city  200,000  the  city. 
francs  each  year  for  the  right  to  lay  its  pipes  under  the 


48 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Municipal 
treasury 
shares  in 
surplus  pro- 
fits. 


Financial 

aspects 

summed  up. 


Amount  of 
the  city's 
revenues 
from  gas 
company. 


sidewalks.  In  lieu  of  an  octroi  tax  upon  the  coal  con- 
sumed in  making  gas,  the  city  receives  2  francs  for 
each  100  cubic  meters  of  gas  consumed  in  Paris.  The 
price  of  gas  per  cubic  meter  to  private  consumers  is 
fixed  by  agreement,  and  the  price  to  the  city  for  pub- 
lic purposes  is  fixed  at  about  half  that  which  private 
consumers  pay.  The  company  is  allowed,  after  pay- 
ing fixed  charges  and  placing  a  certain  lawful  sum  in 
its  reserve  fund,  to  devote  11,200,000  francs  of  net 
profits  to  paying  dividends  upon  its  84,000,000  francs 
of  capital  stock.  All  surplus  earnings  must  be  equally 
divided  between  the  company  and  the  municipal 
treasury. 

The  financial  aspects  of  this  charter  can  be  briefly 
recapitulated.  The  company  must  furnish  gas  to  in- 
dividuals at  a  price  not  exceeding  a  fixed  maximum. 
It  must  supply  gas  for  public  uses  at  what  is  practi- 
cally the  cost  of  manufacture.  It  must  pay  the  city 
200,000  (ultimately  250,000)  francs  a  year  for  the  right 
to  pipe  the  streets.  It  must  pay  a  tax  of  2  francs  per 
100  cubic  meters  of  gas  supplied  to  Paris.  Further, 
it  must  not  "  water  "  its  stock,  but  must  keep  its  capi- 
talization at  84,000,000  francs,  and  after  paying  13  £ 
per  cent,  out  of  net  profits  as  dividends  to  the  share- 
holders it  must  divide  all  remaining  profits  with  the 
city.  Finally,  at  the  expiration  of  the  charter,  all 
rights  revert  to  the  city,  which  becomes  also  the 
owner  of  all  the  subways,  piping,  etc.,  that  pertain  to 
the  plant. 

The  city's  share  in  the  profits  has  steadily  increased 
until  the  receipts  from  the  gas  company  have  become  a 
large  item  of  revenue.  In  1870  about  5,000,000  francs 
were  received  from  the  company.  For  the  year  1875 
the  amount  exceeded  8,000,000  francs.  In  1880, 12,- 
400,000  francs  were  received,  and  in  1882  more  than 
15,000,000.  For  several  years  past  the  annual  pay- 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  49 

merit  of  the  gas  company  to  the  city  has  been  ap-  CHAP.  L 
proximately  20,000,000  francs.  In  comparison  with 
American  cities,  this  large  sum  is  clear  profit ;  for  we 
do  not  in  this  country  ordinarily  obtain  any  public 
revenue  from  gas  companies.  As  not  less  important, 
moreover,  it  is  to  be  noted  that  Paris  enjoys  the 
further  advantage  of  obtaining  gas  for  public  lighting 
at  rates  approximating  the  lowest  actual  cost  of  manu- 
facture. Most  American  cities  would  congratulate 
themselves  that  they  had  made  an  extraordinary  bar- 
gain if,  in  return  for  the  privileges  they  accord  to  the 
gas  companies,  they  should  have  the  streets  and  pub- 
lie  buildings  lighted  at  cost.  But  Paris  obtains  that  noughts 
concession,  and  20,000,000  francs  a  year  in  addition  cost 
to  it.  Inasmuch  as  street  lamps  and  various  public 
establishments  consume  nearly  one  fifth  of  the  total 
supply  of  gas  in  Paris,  it  is  obvious  that  there  is  very 
substantial  advantage  in  obtaining  the  public  supply 
at  cost.  I  would  suggest  that  American  municipal 
authorities  might  profitably  take  to  heart  the  fact  that 
in  the  past  ten  years  the  Paris  gas  company  has  paid 
into  the  city  treasury  200,000,000  francs,  or  $40,000,000.! 
The  inspection  of  gas  manufacture,  the  testing  of 
the  quality  of  gas,  the  supervision  of  gas-fittings  in 
all  kinds  of  buildings,  and  the  management  of  street  Municipal 
and  public  lighting,  belong  to  one  of  the  bureaus  endiargeSofn 
of  the  department  of  public  works,  and  come  under  lgVice.ser 
general  charge  of  an  engineer-in-chief,  who  has  under 
him  a  staff  of  nearly  one  hundred  ordinary  engineers 
and  assistants.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  this,  like 
all  other  bureaus  of  the  executive  municipal  govern- 
ment, is  a  model  of  efficiency.  Paris,  under  its  intelli- 

1  Electrical  competition,  the  cheapness  of  petroleum,  and  the 
consequent  reductions  in  the  price  of  gas,  have  since  1892 
caused  some  falling  off  in  the  municipal  revenue  from  this 


source. 

4 


50  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  i.  gent  operations,  became  the  most  beautifully  illumined 
of  all  large  cities.  Every  detail  of  the  service  was 
brought  under  strict  regulation,  and  there  is  the  least 
possible  ground  for  complaint  against  the  gas  com- 
pany as  a  private  monopoly. 

The  question  naturally  arises  whether  the  Paris 
plan  is  a  wiser  one  than  that  of  many  great  cities 

The  question    r  .  .  ./     o 

of  public  elsewhere  in  Europe  which  have  assumed  the  gas 
gasworks,  manufacture  as  a  public  monopoly.  Conservative 
Frenchmen  decidedly  prefer  their  own  system,  while 
the  French  radicals  and  socialists  have  begun  on 
doctrinaire  ground  to  demand  that  public  ownership 
and  operation  of  gas-works  which  the  English  and 
German  cities  from  a  wholly  different  point  of  view, 
have  adopted  as  a  piece  of  thrifty  municipal  finan- 
ciering. I  am  inclined  to  the  opinion  that  the  largest 
possible  use  of  gas,  like  that  of  water,  is  to  be  obtained 

A  social     under  a  system  of  public  ownership,  and  that  this 

rather  than     ,  .  i      •       t  i      . 

a  financial    large  use  is  so  desirable  in  a  city  as  to  justify  direct 
quparis.m    municipal  administration.     That  the  poor  people  of 
Paris  could  be  provided  with  gas  both  for  light  and 
for  fuel  at  a  lower  rate  than  they  are  now  obliged  to 
pay,  if  the  municipal  government  were  to  supersede 
the  existing  company,  seems  to  me  to  be  indisputable. 
However,  the  present  system  is  so  good  that  there  is 
comparatively  little  reason  to  desire  a  radical  change. 
Gas-lighting  was  first  introduced  in  England,  but 
Paris  followed  in  good  time  and  with  a  splendor  un- 
equaled  elsewhere.     In  like  manner,  America,  Ger- 
many, and  some  other  countries  have  been  earlier  in 
the  use  of  electric  lighting;  but  the  Parisians,  with 
their  superior  taste  and  skill  in  all  matters  of  muni- 
cipal arrangements  and  appointments,  seem  destined 
to  make  in  the  end  the  most  complete  and  attractive 
Beginnings    use  of  the  new  illuminant.    In  1878,  at  the  time  of 
"lighting.0    the  universal  Exposition,  the  municipal  government 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  51 

ordered  the  experimental  illumination  of  the  Avenue     CHAP.  i. 

de  FOpera  and  several  open  spaces  with  electricity; 

but  the  new  system  was  not  ripe  for  large  use,  and 

the  experiment  was  soon  abandoned.    Its  principal     Effects  or 

...  r         competition. 

effect  was  the  stimulus  it  gave  to  the  gas  company, 
which  invented  and  put  into  use  certain  large  com- 
pound burners  using  1400  liters  per  hour,  and  giving 
a  most  brilliant  light.  The  great  electrical  improve- 
ments of  the  following  decade,  chiefly  American,  were 
exhibited  in  the  French  Exposition  of  1889,  and  were 
studied  with  the  utmost  care  by  the  Parisian  authori- 
ties and  municipal  engineers.  Undoubtedly  the  dis- 
plays at  the  Exposition  had  a  most  pronounced  effect 
in  stimulating  the  new  zeal  Paris  has  since  shown  for 
the  appliances  of  the  electric  age. 

The  manner  in  which  Paris  has  proceeded  to  intro- 
duce electricity  in  every  portion  of  the  municipal 
area  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  all  other  cities 
that  have  to  do  with  similar  problems.  There  has 
been  no  undue  haste.  On  the  contrary,  the  subject 
has  been  treated  in  a  patient,  scientific,  systematic 
way.  To  begin  with,  the  municipalitv  spent  2,000,000 

J  .  ,  .  i     i      il:      1  •      A  11         The  central 

francs  or  more  in  making  a  central  electrical  mstalla-  installation. 
tion  of  its  own  in  the  basement  of  "  Les  Halles  Cen- 
trales,"  the  great  central  market  of  Paris.  This  plant 
is  conveniently  situated  for  the  illumination  of  a  num- 
ber of  public  buildings  and  establishments,  and  it  can 
be  enlarged  indefinitely.  But  it  has  never  been  in- 
tended to  use  this  or  any  other  municipal  installation 
for  the  general  work  of  lighting  the  city.  It  is  for 
experimental  purposes,  and  also  for  the  purpose  of 
acting  as  a  regulator  of  charges.  It  enables  the  mu 
nicipality  to  command  the  situation,  and  gives  it  a 
corps  of  men  who  understand  the  practical  details  of 
an  electrical  establishment.  For  the  purposes  of  gen- 
eral illumination  the  city  has  been  divided  into  seven 


52 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


City  divided 
into  "  sec- 
teurs  elec- 
triques." 


Grants  to 
"various  com- 
panies. 


Conditions 
of  grant. 


Advanta- 
geous po- 
sition of 
municipal 
authorities. 


"  secteurs  electriques."  Paris  is  approximately  a  circle, 
and  the  secteurs  are  segments  the  dividing  lines  of 
which  radiate  from  the  vicinity  of  the  Halles  as  a 
center  and  extend  to  the  circumference.  Each  of 
these  secteurs  was  granted  exclusively,  for  a  short 
term  of  years,  to  a  responsible  electric  company. 
Thus,  Edison  was  accorded  one,  the  great  Paris  con- 
tractor Victor  Popp  (using  the  Thomson-Houston 
system)  obtained  two,  and  the  others  were  conceded 
respectively  to  the  Messrs.  Rothschild,  the  Societe  Al- 
sacienne,  the  Ferranti  Company  of  London,  and  Naze 
&  Co.  (representing  the  Westinghouse  system).  Sev- 
eral of  the  secteurs  were  granted  in  the  latter  part 
of  1890,  completing  the  distribution.  As  one  of  the 
conditions,  it  was  required  that  the  companies  pro- 
ceed at  once  to  make  their  installations,  and  that 
within  two  years  their  districts  should  be  completely 
served  with  main  cables.  Thus,  before  the  end  of 
1892  it  was  expected  that  such  provision  would  have 
been  made  that,  if  desired,  every  street  in  Paris,  as 
well  as  every  house,  could  be  illumined  with  elec- 
tricity. It  was  required  that  the  companies  should 
supply  street  lighting  upon  terms  as  favorable  as  pos- 
sible,— at  cost  or  even  less, — and  a  maximum  rate  of 
charge  to  private  users  was  prescribed.  Each  com- 
pany was  required  to  give  a  guaranty  fund  of  several 
hundred  thousand  francs  to  insure  the  fulfilment  of 
all  the  conditions  imposed  in  the  concession.  No 
payment  was  required  for  the  charters,  the  terms 
being  short,  and  permanent  arrangements  being  de- 
ferred until  use  could  be  made  of  the  results  of  five 
or  ten  years'  experience.  Meanwhile  the  city  had  its 
own  central  plant,  and  was  not  debarred  from  laying 
its  cables  into  any  or  all  of  the  secteurs,  with  a  view 
to  regulating  prices  by  competition.  Thus,  Paris 
seemed  to  have  prepared  the  way  for  a  more  com- 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


53 


plete  supply  of  electric-lighting  facilities  than  any 
other  large  city  in  the  world.  The  process  of  trans- 
formation has  not  been  as  rapid  as  was  expected,  and 
except  on  the  boulevards  and  a  few  central  avenues 
and  squares,  the  displacement  of  gas  by  electricity 
had  not  in  1895  been  very  conspicuously  accomplished. 
But  if  the  companies  have  gained  some  postponement 
of  the  time  limits  within  which  their  districts  shall  be 
completely  cabled,  the  city  in  its  turn  has  exacted  a 
yearly  street  rental  of  200  francs  for  each  kilometer  of 
cable,  besides  imposing  the  lucrative  tax  of  five  per 
cent,  on  the  gross  receipts  of  the  companies. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  question  how  to  dis- 
pose of  wires  —  a  question  that  has  made  so  con- 
tinually recurring  an  agitation  in  all  American  cities 
—  never  comes  up  at  all  in  Paris,  and  is  seldom 
mentioned  in  any  European  city.  There  are  abso- 
lutely no  obstructive  wires  in  Paris.  The  govern- 
ment has  purchased  the  telephone  as  well  as  the 
telegraph  system,  and  all  the  wires  for  these  services 
are  placed  in  the  subways  or  sewers.  The  wires  of 
the  electric-light  companies  are  buried  under  the 
sidewalks.  Armored  cables  are  laid  in  simple  con- 
duits, or  even  in  the  bare  soil,  without  the  slightest 
difficulty  from  any  point  of  view.  In  crossing  streets 
it  is  forbidden  to  break  the  paving,  and  underground 
connection  is  made  from  the  manholes  of  the  sewers. 
The  whole  city  of  Paris  will  have  been  laid  with  a 
network  of  electric-lighting  cables,  and  traffic  on  the 
sidewalks  and  in  the  streets  will  have  suffered  a 
minimum  of  obstruction,  while  no  injury  whatsoever 
will  have  been  done  to  pavements.  Many  of  these  mi- 
nor questions  of  practical  municipal  engineering  that 
our  American  cities  too  often  attack  in  a  fumbling, 
rude,  original  way,  heedless  even  of  the  experience 
of  near  neighbors,  while  densely  and  contentedly 


CHAP.  I. 


Money  pay- 
ments by  the 
companies. 


Wires  in  sub- 
ways or 


European 
superiority 
in  engineer- 
ing details. 


54  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  i.  ignorant  of  the  experience  of  foreign  cities,  have 
been  thoroughly  solved  in  Europe.  Instead  of  lead- 
ing the  van,  America  has  lagged  from  ten  to  fifteen 
years  behind  Europe  in  these  matters.  Even  in  our 

The  tes«  own  ^e^  °^  electrical  methods,  as  a  prominent 
monyofan  American  electrician  once  assured  me  in  Paris,  we 

American  ' 

electrician,  are  five  years  behind  the  Continent.  He  declared 
that  the  difficulties  our  American  corporations  still 
complain  about  when  asked  to  bury  their  telegraph, 
telephone,  and  lighting  wires,  were  all  met  and  van- 
quished in  Europe  several  years  ago,  and  that  our 
fellow-countrymen  insist  upon  remaining  in  a  state 
of  invincible  ignorance  rather  than  learn  from  the 
technical  and  scientific  achievements  of  Europe.  But 
perhaps  he  stated  the  case  too  strongly.  Doubtless 
we  shall  in  time  come  to  a  realizing  sense  of  the 
fact  that  the  one  city  of  Paris  has  at  its  command 
a  larger  and  more  brilliant  array  of  engineering  and 
architectural  talent  than  all  the  important  cities  of 
the  United  States  taken  together  can  show,  and  that 
many  a  small  European  town  is  better  supplied  in 
this  respect  than  many  a  large  American  city. 

The  street  system  —  the  voie  publique  —  keeps  its 
place  at  the  very  heart  and  center  of  Parisian  ad- 

The  streets 

as  a  primary  ministration.  The  French  capital  has  unflinchingly 
Paris.  accepted  the  doctrine  that  smooth  and  clean  high- 
ways are  a  wise  investment  from  every  point  of 
view;  and  that  so  long  as  the  work  is  done  in  a 
thorough  and  scientific  manner,  with  an  honest  and 
skilful  application  of  means  to  ends,  the  result  is 
worth  having,  regardless  of  cost.  The  expense  of 
maintaining,  cleaning,  and  sprinkling  the  streets  is 
vastly  greater  per  capita  in  Paris  than  in  almost  any 
other  European  city;  but  the  sort  of  preeminence 
that  such  a  street  service  helps  to  secure  is  profitable 
in  a  hundred  indirect  ways. 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


55 


The  service  of  the  voie  publique  includes  street- 
making  and  paving;  the  care,  repair,  and  mainte- 
nance of  the  streets  and  sidewalks ;  and  the  sweeping 
and  sprinkling  of  the  streets,  together  with  the  re- 
moval of  the  street  sweepings  and  of  domestic  gar- 
bage. As  a  branch  of  the  department  of  public 
works,  this  task  of  street  maintenance  and  cleansing 
is  placed  in  charge  of  two  engineers-in-chief,  to  each 
of  whom  ten  arrondissements  are  assigned.  The 
twenty  arrondissements  are  further  grouped  in  sec- 
tions comprising  two  or  three  arrondissements.  In 
the  execution  of  the  work,  the  paving  and  the  clean- 
sing are  kept  distinct  from  each  other.  A  large  num- 
ber of  the  national  government's  engineers  from  the 
famous  corps  des  ponts  et  ckaussees  are  always  as- 
signed to  the  Parisian  public  works  and  placed  at 
the  disposal  of  the  director ;  and  employed  with  them 
are  many  engineers  belonging  primarily  to  the  mu- 
nicipal service.  The  cleansing  organization  is  as 
completely  manned  with  these  highly  trained  tech- 
nical experts  as  is  that  of  paving,  lighting,  parks, 
water-supply,  or  sewerage. 

The  annual  outlay  under  the  general  category  of 
the  voie  publique  reaches  approximately  twenty-five 
million  francs.  For  a  number  of  years  the  national 
treasury  has  contributed  a  fixed  yearly  subsidy  of 
four  million  francs,  and  the  department  of  the  Seine 
has  contributed  one  tenth  of  that  amount,  in  accor- 
dance with  the  theory  that  the  chief  thoroughfares  of 
Paris  are  to  be  considered  as  the  continuation  of 
national  roads  and  departmental  highways.  In  the 
original  paving  of  a  Parisian  street,  it  is  the  rule 
to  assess  most  of  the  cost  against  the  owners  of 
abutting  property.  In  the  case,  however,  of  a  great 
avenue  or  boulevard  having  exceptional  width,  the 
owners  of  frontage  pay  only  for  a  strip  of  perhaps 
ten  or  twelve  meters  on  either  side,  and  the  rest  of 


CHAP.  I. 


Organiza- 
tion of  pav- 
ing and 
cleansing. 


National 

subvention 

for  Paris 

streets. 


Paving  as- 
sessments. 


56  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

the  cost  is  borne  by  the  municipal  treasury.  Once 
added  to  the  list  of  paved  thoroughfares,  a  street 
becomes  a  public  charge,  and  the  repair  and  renewal 
of  the  paving  are  undertaken  at  the  expense  of  the 
whole  city. 

A  remarkable  degree  of  uniformity  and  of  perfec- 
tion has  been  attained  in  the  general  condition  and 

Materials  °  . 

used  in  appearance  of  the  pavements  of  Paris,  although  a 
ing.  variety  of  materials  has  been  used.  The  area  of 
asphalt  surface  increases  year  by  year,  while  care- 
fully cut  and  evenly  placed  stone  blocks  still  consti- 
tute by  far  the  largest  portion  of  the  paved  streets. 
The  municipality  works  its  own  quarries  for  a  large 
proportion  of  the  paving  blocks  that  it  uses,  and  also 
for  the  rough  stone  needed  in  road-  and  street-mak- 
ing. When  wood  paving  had  been  quite  generally 
abandoned  in  American  cities  as  a  failure  from  every 
standpoint,  the  Parisian  engineers  had  begun  to  de- 
monstrate the  excellences  of  this  American  invention, 
with  the  consequence  that  the  extent  of  smooth  and 
noiseless  wood-paved  roadways,  so  much  cheaper  than 
asphalt  and  so  much  safer  for  horses,  has  been  rapidly 
increasing. 

The  success  of  wood  paving  in  Paris  has  been  due 
success  of  in  part  to  a  favorable  climate,  but  most  of  all  to  the 
pavements,  fact  of  thorough  and  scientific  workmanship,  after 
careful  testing  of  different  woods  and  different  meth- 
ods of  treatment,  chemical  and  mechanical.  Experi- 
ments made  until  about  1882  were  disappointing. 
But  an  English  company  at  that  time  offered  an  im- 
proved process,  and  agreed  to  assume  all  the  risks 
of  failure.  Accordingly,  this  company  (afterward 
transformed  into  a  Franco-English  company  with 
headquarters  at  Paris)  obtained  concessions  for  the 
paving  of  a  number  of  the  most  important  streets, 
including  the  Avenue  des  Champs-ElysSes,  the  Rue 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


57 


Montmartre,  the  Rue  de  Rivoli,  the  Avenue  de  PO- 
pera,  and  the  Boulevard  Poissonniere.  Under  this 
arrangement  the  company  agreed  to  construct  the 
pavements  on  a  proper  cement  foundation,  and  to 
keep  them  in  perfect  repair  for  a  term  of  years,  re- 
ceiving in  payment  an  annuity  of  about  two  and  a 
half  francs  per  square  meter  for  the  original  cost, 
and  a  further  annuity  of  similar  average  amount  for 
keeping  the  pavement  in  good  condition  through  the 
period  of  the  contract.  From  the  opening  of  1883  to 
1894  a  number  of  these  agreements  were  made,  ap- 
plying to  different  streets  or  portions  of  streets,  and 
eighteen  years  was  the  contract  period  for  which 
most  of  the  work  was  taken  in  hand.  In  their  wise 
protection  of  public  interests,  these  paving  contracts 
furnish  a  characteristic  example  of  the  methods  of 
the  Paris  municipality  in  its  dealings  with  private 
corporations  and  concessionnaires.  Having  made  its 
investment,  the  company's  reimbursement  was  to  take 
the  form  of  eighteen  equal  yearly  instalments,  with 
the  certainty  of  forfeiture  of  all  outstanding  sums  if 
the  paving  were  not  kept  in  a  satisfactory  condition 
up  to  the  very  end  of  the  eighteen-year  term. 

Meanwhile  the  officials  and  engineers  of  the  voie 
publique  have  learned  precisely  what  it  costs  to  lay 
and  repair  wooden  pavements,  and  how  long  they 
may  be  expected  to  wear  in  different  classes  of 
streets.  They  have  accordingly  found  it  advanta- 
geous to  construct  such  pavements  without  the  inter- 
vention of  a  contracting  company.  In  1895  Paris 
had  perhaps  forty  miles  of  wood-paved  streets,  of 
which  about  one  third  were  under  direct  municipal 
management,  while  two  thirds  were  maintained  under 
contracts  which  will  expire  in  the  years  from  1901 
to  1905.  It  should  be  said  that  the  maintenance  of 
the  greater  part  of  the  asphalt  paving  of  Paris  is 


CHAP.  I. 

Terms  of 
paving  con- 
tracts. 


Public 
interests 
guarded. 


Future  pol- 
icy in  con- 
struction of 
pavements. 


58 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Macadam- 
ized Roads. 


An  instance 
of  coopera- 
tion. 


also  in  the  hands  of  contractors  who  have  assumed 
the  risks  for  a  term  of  years,  although  the  admin- 
istration has  now  begun  to  lay  its  own  asphalt,  the 
experiment  having  been  satisfactory.  Few  cities  un- 
derstand as  well  as  Paris  how  to  make  this  advan- 
tageous temporary  use  of  the  private  entrepreneur. 
As  regards  both  asphalt  and  wood,  it  has  been  clearly 
demonstrated  that  the  engineers  of  the  voie  publique 
can  keep  the  pavements  in  good  condition  for  much 
less  money  per  square  meter  than  is  paid  to  the  con- 
tracting companies  for  maintenance.  Consequently, 
there  can  be  no  question  as  to  the  permanent  policy. 

A  limited  portion — perhaps  fifteen  per  cent. — of  the 
Paris  street  surface  is  macadamized.  But  no  other 
portions  are  more  skilfully  maintained ;  for  the  mak- 
ing of  good  roads  is  one  of  the  notable  accomplish- 
ments of  the  French  engineers  in  the  public  service, 
and  the  "  metaled "  or  macadamized  roadways  of 
Paris  are  models  of  their  kind.  In  1894  they  gave 
employment  to  a  regular  force  of  about  thirteen  hun- 
dred workmen,  and  to  a  great  number  of  horses  and 
carts  engaged  in  transporting  materials. 

There  is  some  indication  of  thrifty  management  in 
the  fact  that  the  service  of  macadamized  roads,  which 
is  an  extensive  keeper  of  horses,  is  able  to  supply 
the  street-sweeping  service,  during  several  hours  each 
day,  with  the  teams  required  for  two  or  three  hun- 
dred sweeping-machines.  It  is  also  in  position  to 
furnish  numerous  teams  for  the  sprinkling-carts. 
The  cleansing  service  pays  the  macadamized  road 
service  an  agreed  amount  per  hour  for  each  team, 
and  the  transaction  is  obviously  economical.  It  en- 
ables the  cleansing  department  to  use  a  large  number 
of  teams  for  a  fraction  of  the  day,  without  obliging 
that  service  to  pay  more  than  a  proportional  share 
of  the  cost  of  the  horses  and  their  drivers. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  69 

The  macadamized  road  service  manages  its  own     CHAP.  i. 
street  cleaning,  scavenging  and  sprinkling;  but  for 

the  rest  of  Paris,  including  all  the  paved  streets  and    The  cleans- 

i_   •      j-  Is      Ai  •      j      Ing  depart- 

squares,  the  cleansing  work  is  distinctly  organized,       ment. 

and  has  been  brought  to  an  efficiency  which  makes  it 
quite  as  noteworthy  as  any  part  of  the  Parisian  mu- 
nicipal housekeeping.  From  very  ancient  times  it 
was  the  law  that  each  owner  or  occupier  of  property 
should  sweep  his  share  of  the  street.  The  rules  were 
enforced  by  the  police.  "When  the  modern  street  re-  History  of 

*      .      *  .  street  clean- 

forms  began  in  earnest  in  1853,  new  rules  were  pro-  i«g- 
mulgated  requiring  thorough  daily  cleansing  of  all 
public  ways.  But  the  sweeping  of  squares  and  of  the  * 
middle  strip  of  broad  avenues  devolved  upon  the  city 
itself;  and  as  standards  became  more  fastidious  the 
public  task  grew  larger.  At  the  time  of  the  extension 
of  the  municipal  limits  in  1860  the  entire  charge  of 
street  cleansing  was  transferred  from  the  domain  of 
the  prefect  of  police  to  that  of  the  prefect  of  the 
Seine,  and  it  was  assigned  to  the  engineers  of  the  voie 
publique  under  the  general  control  of  the  director 
of  public  works.  Gradually  individual  owners  began 
to  adopt  the  plan  of  making  a  money  payment  and 
allowing  the  administration  to  cleanse  their  portions 
of  the  street.  In  1873  the  department  found  itself  Egtab]igh. 
actually  performing  half  of  the  cleansing  of  Paris,  ment  of  MI 

•     *  07       municipal 

and  it  was  evident  that  the  best  results  would  be  service. 
gained  by  a  uniform  municipal  service.  Accordingly, 
a  law  was  enacted  transforming  the  citizen's  old-time 
obligation  into  a  direct  money  tax.  The  streets  were 
minutely  classified  according  to  their  character,  and 
a  schedule  of  charges  was  made  out,  which  is  subject 
to  revision  every  five  years.  It  is  intended  to  keep 
the  tax  down  to  the  actual  cost  of  the  service. 

In  the  work  of  cleansing  and  watering  the  streets 
of  Paris  nearly  five  thousand  persons  are  constantly 


60 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 

The  street- 
cleaning 
army. 


Complete 
cleansing 

every 
morning. 


The  order 
of  the  day. 


Sprinkling 
the  streets. 


employed.  The  number  would  be  much  greater  but 
for  the  fact  that  several  hundred  sweeping-machines 
do  the  work  that  otherwise  would  require  the  services 
of  at  least  three  thousand  additional  hand-workers. 
The  great  triumph  of  the  Paris  system  is  its  com- 
plete and  simultaneous  collection  and  removal  at  an 
early  hour  every  morning  of  all  detritus  and  domestic 
waste  throughout  the  entire  metropolis.  Between  four 
o'clock  and  half -past  six  the  entire  paving  of  the  city, 
including  sidewalks,  roadways,  gutters,  open  squares, 
alleys  and  courts,  has  been  swept  by  machine  and 
by  hand,  and  much  of  it  has  been  scrubbed  and  dis- 
infected, while  many  smooth  streets  also  have  been 
sprinkled  with  clean  sand  to  prevent  the  slipping  of 
horses.  At  half-past  six  the  teams  begin  to  remove 
the  heaps  of  detritus,  and  also  to  collect  the  garbage 
that  has  been  placed  on  the  sidewalk  in  special  re- 
ceptacles in  front  of  every  house.  By  half -past  eight 
at  the  very  latest  the  collection  and  removal  is  at  an 
end,  the  empty  garbage  receptacles  have  been  cleansed 
and  disinfected  and  have  disappeared  from  the  side- 
walks, and  the  main  task  of  the  cleansing  department 
has  been  performed  for  the  day.  But  the  army  of 
street  cleansers — organized  in  perhaps  150  bands  of 
twenty  or  thirty  persons,  with  a  sectional  atelier,  or 
headquarters  shop,  where  each  band  reports  for  duty — 
is  kept  steadily  at  work.  Before  eleven  o'clock  the 
gutters  have  been  scrubbed,  and  much  other  work  in 
detail  has  been  performed,  while  immediate  removal 
of  all  fresh  litter  or  manure  from  the  pavements  is 
required.  Meanwhile,  except  in  unseasonable  weather, 
the  sprinkling  of  the  streets  has  begun,  partly  by 
means  of  wagons,  but  largely  and  to  a  fast  increasing 
extent  by  the  use  of  small  stationary  devices  some- 
what resembling  the  ordinary  lawn  or  garden  sprin- 
kler, thousands  of  which  are  attended  by  the  em- 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


61 


ployees  of  the  street-cleaning  department.  In  the 
afternoon  the  sweeping-machines  are  again  at  work 
on  the  more  frequented  thoroughfares,  and  the  side- 
walks are  again  carefully  swept  by  hand  in  such  a 
way  as  to  avoid  raising  the  dust,  while  the  processes 
of  scrubbing  and  sprinkling  and  flushing  and  disin- 
fection are  unsparingly  applied  to  pavements,  gutters, 
and  public  lavatories. 

The  removal  of  garbage  and  street  sweepings  is 
performed  by  contract.  The  administration  divides 
the  work  into  a  number  of  sections,  and  thus  obtains 
the  services  of  small  contractors.  The  object  aimed 
at  is  the  utilization  of  the  farmers  and  market-gar- 
deners in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  Paris,  who  are 
enabled  to  participate  in  the  contracts.  Nothing 
would  seem  to  be  more  natural  than  a  system  by 
which  the  gardeners  who  bring  supplies  to  the  city 
should  remove  the  garbage  and  sweepings  on  their 
return  trips  to  the  country,  and  should  use  the  ma- 
terial for  fertilizers.  If  such  a  system  were  hap- 
hazard in  its  working  it  could  not  be  tolerated ;  but 
under  the  supervision  of  the  official  engineers  and 
inspectors  of  the  cleansing  department,  a  remarkable 
state  of  completeness,  uniformity,  and  methodical 
efficiency  has  been  secured.  In  view  of  all  the  local 
circumstances,  it  is  hardly  possible  to  see  how  any- 
thing could  be  gained  by  an  abandonment  of  the 
contract  system.  The  contract  applies  only  to  the 
driver  and  team,  the  city  itself  providing  the  labor 
that  loads  the  cart,  and  directly  supervising  and 
controlling  every  detail. 

The  removal  of  snow  and  ice  from  Paris  streets 
is  a  special  service  for  which  elaborate  emergency 
rules  exist.  The  police  department  cooperates  with 
the  forces  of  the  voie  publique,  and  the  householders 
are  also  under  obligations  to  assist.  Temporary 


CHAP.  I. 


Garbage 
removal. 


Employ- 
ment of 
market- 
gardeners. 


Removal 
of  snow. 


62 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


of  public 
cleansing. 


CHAP.  i.  employees  are  added  to  the  regular  cleansing  force, 
sometimes  to  the  number  of  ten  thousand  or  more; 
and  thus  at  least  fifteen  thousand  men  will  be  en- 
gaged in  shoveling  and  removing  snow.  In  the  final 
disposition  of  snow,  much  use  is  made  of  the  huge 
trunk  sewers. 

If  I  have  dwelt  with  some  elaboration  of  detail  upon 
the  public  cleansing  work,  it  has  been  solely  for  the 
importance  purpose  of  making  plain  the  exceedingly  great  im- 
portance that  Paris  attaches  to  this  branch  of  ad- 
ministration. I  have  scarcely  hinted  at  the  perfection 
of  the  utensils,  the  magnitude  of  the  "plant,"  and  the 
infinite  painstaking  and  trained  skill  that  make  the 
technical  aspects  of  the  work  so  creditable  and  also 
so  interesting.  Without  this  ministry  of  public  cleans- 
ing, modern  Paris  would  not  be  itself.  It  enters  into 
the  whole  life  of  the  people,  rich  and  poor  alike. 

In  the  great  programme  of  the  Napoleon-Hauss- 
Water-sup-  mann  period  a  new  water-supply  and  a  system  of 
sewersd  sewers  were  included  as  highly  essential  features  of 
the  modernized  Paris.  The  provision  of  water  for 
public  and  private  use,  and  the  creation  of  ample 
drainage  facilities,  were  recognized  as  kindred  muni- 
cipal functions,  primary  and  vital,  and  they  were 
united  under  the  charge  of  a  directeur  des  eaux  ct 
fyouts  (director  of  waterworks  and  sewers),  his  de- 
partment forming  one  of  the  bureaus  of  the  general 
department  of  public  works,  and  having  a  position 
coordinate  with  that  of  the  voie  publique.  The 
history  of  the  Paris  Eaux  et  figouts  is  a  valuable  one, 
of  which  the  most  instructive  chapters  are  the  most 
recent  and  the  least  known.  It  is  under  the  present 
republic,  and  not  under  the  third  empire,  that  the 
most  important  results  have  been  attained  in  the 
perfection  of  these  services.  However,  the  later  ac- 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


63 


complishmeuts  cannot  be  understood  except  in  their 
relation  to  earlier  plans  and  achievements. 

Royal  and  municipal  authority  for  several  centu- 
ries had  given  some  concern  to  the  water-supply  of 
Paris;  and  although  at  the  beginning  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  the  entire  amount  provided  daily  did 
not  average  more  than  fourteen  liters  per  inhabitant, 
it  may  be  said  that  the  Paris  arrangements  were  in 
advance  of  those  to  be  found  in  other  European 
cities.  The  impulse  of  the  great  Revolution  led, 
however,  to  the  undertaking  of  the  largest  water- 
supply  project  of  those  times.  This  was  the  construc- 
tion of  the  Canal  de  1'Ourcq.  The  little  river  Ourcq 
is  a  tributary  of  the  Marne.  Its  connection  with 
Paris  by  a  caual  had  for  centuries  been  discussed,  as 
a  means  for  bringing  the  capital  into  navigable  com- 
munication with  a  system  of  waterways  in  the  north 
and  east  of  France.  In  the  first  decade  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  it  was  determined  to  construct  this 
canal  for  the  double  purpose  of  navigation  and  wa- 
ter-supply. A  great  reservoir  was  provided  in  the 
northeast  of  Paris  (Bassin  de  la  Villette),  the  work 
was  crowded  with  all  possible  expedition,  and  the 
new  system  was  in  actual  operation  at  the  end  of 
1808.  It  was  not  on  account  of  sanitary  objections 
to  the  water  of  the  Seine  that  the  Ourcq  water  was 
introduced  by  a  canal  some  scores  of  miles  in  length, 
for  the  quality  of  the  Seine  water  was  decidedly  pref- 
erable. It  was  because  at  that  time  the  modern 
steam-pumping  system  was  in  its  infancy,  and  al- 
though two  or  three  steam-pumps  had  been  set  at 
work  in  the  years  from  1777  to  1782,  the  venture  had 
not  been  very  encouraging.  The  Ourcq  Canal,  on 
the  other  hand,  reaches  Paris  on  comparatively  high 
ground,  and  can  afford  gravity  distribution  to  most 
parts  of  the  city.  By  extensions  and  added  sources 


CHAP.  I. 


Beginnings 
of  Parisian 
waterworks. 


The  Ourcq 
Canal. 


The  Seine 

and  the  first 

steam- 

putnps. 


64 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT    IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Situation  in 
1854. 


Belgrand's 
new  system. 


A  double 
supply. 


River  water 
for  public 

use,  spring 
water  for 
houses. 


of  supply,  the  capacity  of  the  Ourcq  Canal  was 
largely  increased  from  time  to  time,  and  it  remained 
the  chief  source  of  supply  when,  in  1854,  the  new 
order  of  things  demanded  radical  measures  of  relief. 

M.  Belgrand,  the  distinguished  engineer  who  was 
made  the  master  builder  of  the  new  underground 
Paris,  and  who  served  for  many  years  as  head  of  the 
eaux  et  egouts,  laid  down  in  1854  the  principles  of  a 
new  water  system,  making  it  harmonize  with  those 
of  a  new  sewer  system,  each  being  the  complement 
of  the  other.  The  existing  water-supply  was  con- 
demned as  by  far  too  small  in  quantity,  and  as  un- 
suitable in  quality.  The  nature  of  the  surrounding 
country  made  it  difficult  to  introduce  a  large  supply 
from  high  sources  that  would  meet  requirements  as 
to  quality. 

M.  Belgrand  was  forced  to  conclude  that  for  Paris 
the  permanent  solution  must  be  found  in  a  double 
system.  The  waters  of  the  Ourcq  and  of  the  Seine 
could  be  carried  through  one  system  of  pipes  and 
used  for  street  cleaning,  sewer  flushing,  ornamental 
fountains,  and  various  other  public  purposes,  together 
with  certain  manufacturing  and  private  purposes, 
while  aqueducts  from  distant  springs  and  mountain- 
built  reservoirs  could  furnish  a  supply  for  drinking 
and  strictly  domestic  purposes,  to  be  distributed 
through  a  distinct  ramification  of  pipes.  The  plac- 
ing of  the  two  systems  of  pipes  in  the  sewer  tunnels 
would  facilitate  their  management.  The  great  pro- 
jects of  broad,  new  boulevards,  public  gardens,  tree- 
lined  avenues,  and  general  municipal  renovation, 
would  clearly  make  necessary  an  unprecedented  use 
of  water  for  public  purposes.  Indeed,  it  was  evident 
that  more  would  be  needed  for  public  than  for  pri- 
vate uses.  An  average  daily  supply  of  about  eighty- 
five  liters  per  inhabitant  had  been  attained  in  1855, 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


65 


and  it  was  desired  by  Belgrand,  Haussmann,  and  their 
imperial  chief  to  bring  the  amount  up  to  two  hun- 
dred liters  at  the  earliest  possible  moment.  To  some 
extent  the  work  on  the  new  system  could  begin  at 
once,  although  for  the  most  part  it  must  await  the 
completion  of  the  sewers. 

The  plans  were  approved  and  the  work  was  entered 
upon.  In  1856  Paris  had  in  round  figures  1,175,000 
inhabitants.  To  this  number  there  were  added  500,- 
000  in  1860  by  the  annexation  of  the  suburban  belt. 
Belgrand  found  his  problem  of  water-supply  and 
sewers  enormously  increased  by  the  addition  of  so 
many  people,  and  particularly  by  the  more  than 
doubling  of  his  territory.  Moreover,  there  was  a 
private  water  company  to  deal  with.  Consolidation 
of  two  or  three  companies  had  brought  the  supply 
of  the  entire  suburban  belt  within  the  control  of 
a  "  Compagnie  Gen6rale  des  Eaux,"  with  long-time 
franchises.  This  company  was  providing  a  shock- 
ingly unwholesome  and  insufficient  supply  at  enor- 

0  »          .  *  *  • 

mous  prices  to  consumers.  The  amount  supplied  per 
capita  was  about  one  third  that  which  had  long 
been  distributed  within  the  old  limits,  and  the  price 
per  cubic  meter  was  about  three  times  as  high  under 
private  control  in  the  suburbs  as  under  municipal 
management  in  the  city.  It  was  obvious  that  the 
annexed  districts  would  have  to  be  placed  on  an 
equality  with  the  inner  arrondissements  in  regard  to 
the  supply  of  water,  and  the  city  had  somehow  to 
dispose  of  the  company.  A  financial  arrangement 
(which  I  shall  explain  in  a  subsequent  paragraph) 
gave  the  public  administration  complete  possession 
and  control  of  the  entire  system. 

The  Seine  water  was  at  that  time  considered  far 
more  desirable  for  private  uses  than  the  Ourcq;  and 
the  first  step  taken  for  extension  of  supply  was  the 


CHAP.  i. 


ban  water 

system. 


66 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


New  pump- 
ing-stations. 


The  Dhuis 
aqueduct. 


The  Vannes 
aqueduct. 


Completed 
in  1874. 


The  system 
in  general. 


establishment  of  large  new  pumping-stations  on  the 
river  banks,  for  the  service  of  half  the  new  territory. 
The  other  half,  comprising  the  four  outer  arrondisse- 
ments  lying  on  the  north  and  east,  could  not  be 
easily  supplied  from  the  Seine.  It  was  accordingly 
decided  to  furnish  the  quantity  needed  for  public 
purposes  by  means  of  a  pumping-station  several 
miles  distant  on  the  river  Marne,  and  to  obtain  the 
domestic  supply  through  a  long  aqueduct  to  the 
sources  of  the  Dhuis,  about  130  kilometers  (80  miles) 
east  of  Paris.  The  amount  derivable  from  this  distant 
source  was  not  very  large,  but  it  could  be  relied  upon 
as  the  final  supply  of  domestic  water  for  a  consid- 
erable district  of  the  metropolis.  The  work  was 
completed  in  1865. 

Temporary  necessities  having  been  met  for  the 
entire  city,  M.  Belgrand  and  the  administration  be- 
gan at  once  to  provide  for  the  future  double  service 
of  the  central  arrondissements.  The  valley  at  the 
sources  of  the  river  Vannes,  which  could  yield  more 
than  one  hundred  thousand  cubic  meters  per  day, 
was  secured,  and  work  was  begun  upon  a  great  aque- 
duct 173  kilometers  (107  miles)  long.  The  Vannes 
sources,  like  those  of  the  Dhuis,  lie  somewhat  south 
of  east  from  Paris.  The  Vannes  aqueduct  was  not 
finished  when  war  closed  the  imperial  regime;  but 
the  work  was  resumed  under  the  republic,  and  the 
Vannes  water  reached  Paris  in  1874.  Subsequent 
improvements  brought  the  daily  yield  of  this  aque- 
duct up  to  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  thousand 
cubic  meters.  From  1854  to  1874  there  had  been 
expended  one  hundred  million  francs  upon  works 
for  the  introduction  and  distribution  of  a  Paris 
water-supply.  It  would  be  tedious  to  recount  the 
details  of  reservoirs,  pumping-stations,  and  general 
plant,  comprising  a  distributive  system  that  had 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


67 


undergone  enormous  improvements  in  the  following 
twenty  years.  The  Ourcq,  Marne,  and  Seine  had 
continued  to  furnish  the  great  bulk  of  the  supply, 
the  tendency  being  to  withdraw  the  river  water  at 
points  more  remote  from  contamination,  and  to  give 
more  attention  to  projects  of  subsidence  and  filtra- 
tion. In  1892  the  rivers  were  furnishing  more  than 
three  fourths  of  the  six  hundred  thousand  cubic 
meters  that  were  required  every  day. 

But  the  plan  of  an  eventually  complete  domestic 
supply  from  distant  spring  sources,  as  laid  down  by 
M.  Belgrand,  had  never  been  abandoned,  and  in  1886 
definite  steps  were  taken  to  secure  an  additional 
quantity  of  spring  water.  Another  group  of  sources 
was  designated  in  the  east,  near  Provins,  while  west- 
ward, at  the  distance  of  one  hundred  and  ten  kilo- 
meters, was  found  a  favorable  spot  near  Verneuil, 
where  the  Vigne  and  the  Avre  have  their  origin  in 
the  hills,  and  where  a  system  of  dams  and  reservoirs 
could  readily  secure  for  Paris  an  average  supply  of 
one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  cubic  meters  daily 
of  an  exceedingly  satisfactory  drinking-water.  Thirty- 
five  million  francs  were  set  aside  as  the  estimated  cost 
of  the  works,  and  this  great  Avre  aqueduct  was  fin- 
ished in  1894,  with  the  result  of  nearly  doubling  the 
amount  of  spring  water  that  comes  to  Paris  for  do- 
mestic uses.  In  due  time  the  new  eastern  sources 
will  have  been  utilized,  and  the  double  system  will 
have  been  carried  out  in  an  ideal  manner  for  all 
Paris. 

No  other  city  uses  water  in  so  large  a  proportion 
of  the  whole  supply  for  street  and  public  purposes, 
and  in  no  other  great  city  would  the  circumstances  so 
clearly  point  to  the  double  system  as  an  advantageous 
one.  With  numerous  reservoirs,  numerous  pumping- 
works,  and  several  distinct  elements  in  the  main  sup- 


CHAP.  I. 


More  recent 
projects. 


Completion 
in  1894  of 
great  Avre 
aqueduct. 


A  complex 
but  harmo- 
nious sys- 
tem. 


68  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  ply,  the  department  finds  it  possible  to  mix  waters,  to 
alternate,  and  to  utilize  in  various  ways  a  distributing 
plant  that  is  remarkably  adaptable.  There  is  an  en- 
viable simplicity  in  the  magnificent  supply  of  Glas- 
gow, which  derives  from  one  lofty  and  immaculate 
source  an  unbounded  supply  of  the  purest  water 
cheaply  enough  to  use  it  for  all  public  and  private 
purposes ;  and  there  is  an  admirable  boldness  in  the 
new  policy  of  Hamburg,  which  takes  the  filthy  water 
of  the  Elbe,  with  one  filtration  plant  reduces  it  to  a 
purity  almost  equal  to  a  distilled  liquid,  and  from 
one  pumping-station  forces  it  everywhere  throughout 
the  city.  But  there  is  also  something  very  admirable 
in  the  development  of  the  Paris  supply,  which  has 
adapted  means  to  ends  so  elaborately,  and  which, 
with  all  its  complexity,  is  approaching  a  very  high 
state  of  engineering  and  sanitary  perfection.  In  the 
forty  years  from  1856  to  1896  there  will  have  been 
expended  upon  waterworks  by  the  Paris  municipality 

waterworks,  an  amount  approaching  two  hundred  and  fifty  million 
francs. 

The  arrangement  by  which  the  municipality  ob- 
tained control  in  1860  of  the  water-supply  of  the 
annexed  zone  was  a  peculiar  one.  The  Compagnie 
Generale  des  Eaux  made  over  to  the  city  all  its  prop- 
erty and  rights,  and  was  installed  as  the  city's  col- 

A  company    lecting  agent  and  intermediary  in  all  dealings  with 

as  collecting          .  .     -..    •  -,        ,          ml  •  r>r>i 

agent.  private  individuals.  The  company  was  given  a  fifty 
years'  interest  in  the  proceeds  of  the  water  business, 
its  charter  running  from  January  1,  1861,  to  January 
1,  1911.  The  company  has  nothing  to  do  with  the 
fixing  of  the  rentals  or  price  schedules,  and  no  voice, 
however  feeble,  in  any  question  having  to  do  with 
the  supply.  From  time  to  time  the  municipal  author- 
ities readjust  the  scale  of  charges,  and  determine  the 
rules  and  regulations.  The  company  makes  house 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  69 

connections,  and  attends  to  the  domestic  details.  It  CHAP.  i. 
is  allowed  a  commission  of  twenty-five  per  cent,  upon 
its  collections  in  excess  of  three  million  six  hundred 
thousand  francs  up  to  six  million  —  that  is  to  say,  a  contract. 
commission  of  one  fourth  upon  two  million  four 
hundred  thousand  francs.  Its  percentages  grow  less 
as  receipts  increase.  Upon  the  seventh,  eighth,  and 
ninth  million  francs  its  commission  is  twenty  per 
cent.;  upon  the  tenth  and  eleventh  millions  it  is  fif- 
teen per  cent.;  upon  the  twelfth  it  is  ten,  and  upon 
all  collections  in  excess  of  twelve  million  francs  it  is 
five  per  cent.  Thus,  the  receipts  from  private  con- 
sumers having  reached,  let  us  say,  fourteen  million 
francs  in  1895,  the  company's  aggregate  commission 
would  be  one  million  seven  hundred  thousand  francs. 
The  company's  interests  naturally  make  for  vigilance 
in  collections;  and  the  scale  of  charges  is  so  ar- 
ranged that  the  company,  though  not  directly  af- 
fected by  the  cost  of  supply,  is  an  active  opponent  of 
waste.  The  best  quality  of  water  has  always  been 
scarce  enough  in  Paris  to  inculcate  a  gaged  and 
measured  economy  in  its  distribution  that  has  per- 
haps at  times  sacrificed  the  social  to  the  commercial 
aspect  of  a  water-supply.  But  the  prices  charged  to 
the  poor  are  not  very  high,  though  they  are  not  so 
low  as  English  and  Scotch  prices.  The  lowest  annual  water-rates. 
water-rate  in  Paris  is  twenty  francs  a  year,  based 
upon  an  estimated  average  consumption  of  one 
hundred  and  twenty-five  liters  a  day.  In  view  of 
the  conditions  under  which,  in  1860,  the  company 
was  accorded  its  present  functions,  it  cannot  be  said 
that  its  capital  of  twenty  million  francs  is  unduly  re- 
munerated at  the  public  expense ;  nor  do  its  services 
seem  to  be  otherwise -than  meritorious  and  efficient. 
Its  collections  in  gross  are  paid  into  the  public  treasury 
every  week,  and  its  commissions  are  repaid  to  it  at 


70 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 

Ultimate 
fate  of  the 
company. 


Free  supply 
for  public 
purposes. 


Early  drain- 
age system. 


First  mod- 
ern sewer 
in  1851. 


stated  intervals.  It  is  hardly  probable  that  the  city 
will  find  any  sufficient  reasons  for  continuing  to  em- 
ploy the  company  after  the  year  1910. 

It  may  be  added  that  the  company  has  no  concern 
whatever  with  the  system  of  pipes  that  distribute 
water  for  public  uses,  and  that  the  municipality  de- 
rives some  income  from  non-municipal  institutions 
which  use  water  for  public  purposes.  The  municipal 
revenue  that  accrues  from  private  users  easily  pays 
interest  and  sinking-fund  charges  upon  all  that  is 
invested  in  the  water-supply  system,  together  with 
all  the  costs  of  maintenance  and  operation,  and  leaves 
some  surplus  profit.  The  chief  municipal  benefit, 
obviously,  lies  in  the  free  use  of  half  or  more  of  the 
entire  supply  for  the  public  service  of  streets,  parks, 
sewers,  fire  hydrants,  and  the  like. 

A  certain  type  of  French  fiction  has  given  many 
readers  the  impression  that  the  famous  sewer  system 
of  Paris  possesses  considerable  antiquity.  In  point 
of  sober  fact,  very  little  had  been  done  in  the  con- 
struction of  that  system  before  1860.  Open  ditches 
had  served  all  purposes  of  Paris  drainage  until  1750, 
when  a  little  stream  into  which  many  of  these  ditches 
had  emptied  their  foul  waters  was  covered  over, 
chiefly  in  order  to  make  more  building  space.  Grad- 
ually it  came  to  be  used  as  a  trunk  sewer,  and  a 
number  of  covered  ditches  were  subsequently  drained 
into  it.  But  this  was  not  a  modern  sewer,  and  not 
until  1851,  in  connection  with  the  making  of  the  Rue 
de  Rivoli,  was  a  modern  main  sewer  tunnel  built,  its 
point  of  discharge  into  the  Seine  being  just  below 
the  bridge  at  the  Place  de  la  Concorde.  Meanwhile 
a  number  of  small  street  sewers  had  been  conducted 
directly  into  the  river,  and  the  waters  and  banks 
were  becoming  most  seriously  polluted. 

At  this  time  M.  Belgrand  devised  his  magnificent 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  71 

plans  for  the  drainage  and  water-supply  of  the  trans-  CHAP.  i. 
formed  Paris,  and  in  1856  his  scheme  for  a  network  New  system 
of  sewers  was  adopted,  and  he  was  authorized  to  be-  isso. 
gin  construction.  Several  years  had  elapsed,  how- 
ever, before  much  actual  work  had  been  accom- 
plished, and  in  1860  the  annexation  of  the  suburbs 
gave  the  task  a  larger  though  not  a  different  char- 
acter. The  topography  of  Paris  suggested  three 
great  trunk  sewers,  or  collecteurs  (as  Belgrand  well 
called  them),  which  should  have  capacity  to  carry  off 
the  aggregate  outflow  of  the  entire  sewerage  net- 
work, and  which  should  empty  it  all  into  the  Seine 
at  some  distance  below  the  city.  One  of  these  collec- 
teurs was  designed  to  intercept  the  sewers  that  ap- 
proached the  river  on  the  north  or  right  bank,  and 
to  serve  the  central  parts  of  Paris.  A  corresponding 

The  great 

one,  following  for  some  distance  the  left  bank  of  the  trunk  sewers 
river,  was  given  such  dimensions  as  to  be  able  to 
receive  the  flow  of  the  entire  ramification  of  sewers 
south  of  the  Seine.  A  third  collecteur,  at  a  higher 
level,  was  designed  to  carry  off  the  rainfall  and  ordi- 
nary sewage  of  the  more  elevated  arrondissements  of 
the  northeast  part  of  the  city. 

These  three  huge  trunk  sewers,  opened  by  Bel- 
grand,  have  remained  the  basis  of  the  system,  al- 
though since  his  time  a  number  of  additional  secon- 
dary collecteurs  of  formidable  size  have  been  built, 
and  the  network  of  street  sewers  has  been  doubled 
in  extent,  while  great  improvements  in  the  operation 
of  the  system  have  been  inaugurated. 

The  collecteurs  are  great  subterranean  galleries  of 
arched  masonry,  shaped  like  a  horseshoe,  with  a 
diameter  of  not  less  than  fifteen  feet,  and  in  some 

.         „         Forms  and 

cases   nearly  twenty  teet.     The    sewage    ordinarily   dimensions. 
flows  in  a  deep  gutter  at  the  bottom,  with  a  foot- 
path projecting  on  either  side.     This  gutter  has  an 


72  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  average  depth  in  the  great  mains  of  four  or  five  feet, 
and  the  footpaths  are  from  twenty  inches  to  two  or 
three  feet  wide.  The  ordinary  street  sewers  are  egg- 
shaped,  elliptical  conduits,  with  a  vertical  diameter  of 
about  six  or  seven  feet,  and  with  the  small  end  of  the 
ellipse  at  the  bottom.  As  a  rule,  there  is  a  project- 
ing footpath  on  one  side,  at  twelve  or  fifteen  inches 
from  the  bottom.  According  to  the  law  of  1856, 
when  the  system  was  instituted,  every  street  of  less 
than  twenty  meters'  width  must  have  one  of  these 
sewers  under  the  center  of  the  roadway,  while  every 
street  of  more  than  that  width  must  have  two,  one 
being  under  each  sidewalk.  The  sewers  are  of  dif- 
ferent sizes  and  proportions  according  to  the  varying 
circumstances,  and  are  classified  under  fifteen  types. 
They  have  been  planned  not  merely  to  carry  off  the 
drainage  from  streets  and  houses,  but  also  to  serve 
various  subway  purposes  to  which  I  shall  refer  here- 
after. It  was  about  the  year  1881  that  the  sewer 
system,  the  development  of  which  had  been  inter- 
rupted by  the  war  in  1870,  was  taken  in  hand 
again  with  extraordinary  energy.  In  no  other  way 

Recent  de-  ,  _J  T_  v  n 

veiopment.  can  the  vast  amount  of  new  work  be  so  well  appre- 
ciated as  by  study  of  a  sewer  map,  showing  in  one 
color  the  lines  that  had  been  constructed  before  1880, 
and  in  another  color  those  that  have  since  been  com- 
pleted. The  mileage  of  well-built  conduits  seems  to 
have  increased  by  at  least  one  hundred  per  cent.,  and 
the  recent  work  pertains  to  every  locality  in  the 
metropolis. 

Just  before  the  outbreak  of  the  war  of  1870,  Paris 
had  begun  in  a  small  and  tentative  way  the  experi- 
ment of  sewage   disposal  by  means   of  irrigation. 
The  sewage-  The  spot  chosen  was  in  the  plain  of  G-ennevilliers  in 
aueviiiiers.n    the  great  bend  of  the  Seine  north  of  Paris,  this  re- 
gion being  in  the  general  direction  of  the  outfall 


PAKIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  73 

point  of  the  collecteurs,  and  possessing  various  ad-  CHAP.  i. 
vantages  of  soil  and  topography.  The  experiment 
grew  by  degrees  until  in  1892  there  was  an  area 
of  eight  hundred  hectares  (2000  acres)  under  actual 
irrigation,  and  thirty  million  cubic  meters  of  sew- 
age per  annum  was  purified  by  natural  filtration. 
The  tests  of  the  laboratory,  moreover,  showed  that 
the  affluent  passing  from  the  Gennevilliers  drains 
into  the  river  contained  scarcely  a  dozen  microbes  to 
the  cubic  centimeter,  whereas  the  pure  Vanne  drink- 
ing-water contained  62  per  cubic  centimeter,  the  purification. 
Seine  water  at  the  Bercy  pumping-works  contained 
1400,  and  the  unpurified  sewage  itself  contained  20,000. 
The  Parisians  are  now  thoroughly  converted  to  the 
theory  and  practice  of  sewage  disposal  by  means  of 
land  irrigation,  and  are  greatly  extending  the  system 
of  sewage-farms.  They  have  obtained  from  the  gen- 
eral government  a  portion  of  the  St.  Germain  forest, 
which  lies  five  miles  west  of  the  city  limits,  in  one  of  age-eferm7n 
the  series  of  immense  horseshoe  curves  which  the  main  forest! 
Seine  describes  after  it  leaves  the  heart  of  Paris. 
The  large  plans  upon  which  the  administration  has 
entered  have  led  to  the  expectation  that  the  close  of 
the  year  1900  may  witness  the  treatment  of  the  en- 
tire volume  cf  Paris  sewage  by  means  of  irrigation. 
The  Gennevilliers  experiment  has  been  brilliantly 
successful  from  the  agricultural  point  of  view,  the 
crops  having  been  quadrupled,  while  the  population 
of  the  neighborhood  had  nearly  doubled  in  ten  years, 
and  the  community  was  a  model  for  healthf ulness. 

There  remain  to  be  set  forth  certain  changed  con- 
ditions which  give  the  problem  of  sewage  disposal 
a  new  importance.  The  Paris*  sewage  has  hitherto 
held  a  comparatively  small  amount  of  solid  matter 
in  solution.  Its  discharge  into  the  Seine  has  on  that 
account  been  the  less  objectionable.  From  times 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 

The  fosse 
system. 


The  vidan- 
geurs. 


Old  meth- 
ods aban- 
doned. 


immemorial  every  house  in  Paris  has  been  provided 
with  its  fosse,  or  vault,  for  the  reception  of  fecal 
material.  "When  Belgrand  entered  upon  the  con- 
struction of  the  new  sewer  system,  he  favored  the 
adoption,  so  far  as  possible,  of  a  direct  discharge 
from  water-closets  into  the  sewers.  But,  unfortu- 
nately, not  many  of  the  existing  sewers  had  a  suffi- 
ciently steep  fall,  and  many  difficulties  were  in  the 
way.  The  fixed  pits,  or  fosses,  had  at  an  earlier 
period  been  a  frightful  source  of  danger,  disease, 
and  death;  but  great  improvements  had  been  intro- 
duced, both  in  their  construction  and  in  the  methods 
of  emptying  them,  which  had  lessened  their  evils  quite 
appreciably.  The  vidangeurs,  or  night-men,  who  emp- 
tied the  cesspools,  were  licensed  and  brought  under 
the  strictest  public  regulations.  The  material  was 
conveyed  in  air-tight  receptacles,  and  carried  to 
several  great  depots,  where  it  was  converted  into  an 
inoffensive  dry  fertilizer. 

Many  Parisians  contended  that  this  system  of 
fosses  fixes  was  more  to  be  desired  than  the  oppos- 
ing system  known  as  that  of  "  tout  a  legonV  ("  every- 
thing into  the  sewer").  But  tout  &  1'egout  is  the 
system  that  modern  sanitary  science  elsewhere  has 
pronounced  best;  and  Paris  has  at  last  decided  to 
adopt  it.  The  change  has  been  a  gradual  one.  It 
was  ushered  in  by  a  system  of  nitration  apparatus 
which  drains  all  liquids  into  the  sewer,  leaving  only 
solid  matter  in  the  fosse,  and  reducing  the  bulk  of 
the  material  for  the  vidangeur  to  a  small  fraction. 
From  five  thousand  in  1871  these  filters  had  in- 
creased to  thirty-five  thousand  in  1891.  In  1886  it 
was  provided  that  houses  connecting  with  certain 
sewers  which  were  suitably  constructed  might 'avail 
themselves  of  the  tout  a  1'egout  system;  and  in  1891 
about  five  thousand  connections  of  this  kind  had 


PAKIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


75 


actually  been  made.  In  1892  it  was  determined  to 
make  the  modern  system  obligatory  wherever  the 
sewers  could  be  adapted  to  it;  and  since  that  year 
the  transformation  has  been  proceeding  rapidly.  In 
1871  there  were  in  Paris  more  than  eighty  thousand 
cesspools,  and  in  1896  this  number  will  perhaps  have 
been  reduced  to  fifty  thousand. 

The  flushing  of  the  sewers,  in  which  the  ordinary 
flow  is  too  sluggish  for  the  proper  scouring  away  of 
sludgy  sediment,  is  accomplished  by  the  establish- 
ment in  connection  with  them  of  a  system  of  small 
reservoirs  de  ckasse,  so  called,  which  are  filled  and 
discharged  automatically  at  regular  intervals,  and 
which  emit  enough  expulsive  force  to  drive  every- 
thing in  the  sewer  to  a  point  beyond  the  next  reser- 
voir. Soon  after  the  beginning  of  this  system  of 
expulsive  reservoirs,  as  many  as  fourteen  hundred  of 
them  had  been  placed  in  the  sewers.  Several  thou- 
sand will  ultimately  be  needed,  and  they  will  draw 
heavily  upon  the  public  water-supply.  Nothing  in 
the  recent  sanitary  administration  of  Paris  is  more 
significant  than  the  abandonment  of  the  ancient  cess- 
pool system  in  favor  of  the  best  new  methods,  to- 
gether with  the  relief  of  the  river  Seine  through  the 
adoption  of  comprehensive  plans  of  sewage  disposal 
by  means  of  irrigation. 

As  I  have  already  remarked,  the  Paris  sewers  were 
designed  with  reference  to  their  use  as  general  sub- 
ways. Supported  along  the  walls  near  the  top  of  the 
gallery  one  finds  not  only  the  water-pipes  of  the  dou- 
ble supply  system,  but  also  the  telegraph  and  tele- 
phone wires;  the  pneumatic  tubes  which  facilitate 
the  collection  and  distribution  of  letters;  the  pipes 
of  the  compressed-air  service  that  furnishes  motive 
power  for  small  users,  and  that  maintains  a  system  of 


CHAP.  I. 


Disappear- 
ance of  cess- 
pools. 


Reservoirs 

for  flushing 

sewers. 


The  sewers 
as  subways. 


76 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP. i. 


Revenue 
from  wires 
and  pipes 
in  cewers. 


pneumatic  clocks;  and  perhaps  one  or  two  other 
kinds  of  pipes  or  wires.  The  gas  and  electric  light 
companies  are  otherwise  accommodated  under  the 
sidewalks,  but  they  are  the  only  exceptions  to  the  rule 
of  the  use  of  the  sewers  as  conduits  for  all  the  servi- 
ces that  require  pipes  or  wires.  The  telephone  system 
of  Paris  is  operated  by  the  national  government  in 
connection  with  its  department  ofpostes  et  telegraphes; 
and  while  it  pays  nothing  for  its  placing  of  telegraph 
wires  and  pneumatic  tubes  in  the  sewers,  it  pays  lib- 
erally for  its  telephone  accommodations.  Numer- 
ous private  telegraph  and  telephone  wires  also  pay  at 
the  same  rates  (from  fifty  to  thirty  francs  a  year  per 
kilometer  of  line),  and  the  municipal  treasury  from 
these  sources,  together  with  the  payments  from  the 
compressed  air  company,  is  in  receipt  of  a  revenue 
approaching  a  million  francs.  I  have  already  men- 
tioned the  payments  exacted  from  the  gas  and  electric 
light  companies  for  their  privileges  under  the  streets. 
In  nothing  is  the  municipal  thrift  and  close  atten- 
tion to  financial  details  better  illustrated  than  in  the 
Privileges  exploitation  of  small  privileges  and  concessions  in  the 
•tout  in  streets  and  in  the  public  parks.  One  of  the  distinct 

streets  and  j*   T»      •    •  j.-  i 

parks.  sources  or  Parisian  revenue  —  aggregating  a  yearly 
income  of  3,500,000  francs  —  is  summed  up  in  the  offi- 
cial budgets  under  the  chapter  heading,  "Locations 
sur  la  voie  publique  et  dans  les  promenades  publiques" 
In  this  category  are  included  hundreds  of  newspaper 
kiosks,  refreshment  stands,  luminous  advertising  pil- 
lars for  theatrical  notices,  chalets  de  necessity  (public 
lavatories),  and  urinals  to  the  number  of  perhaps  two 
thousand,  the  walls  of  which  are  used  for  advertising 
purposes.  In  the  Champs-Ely  sees,  the  Bois  de  Bou- 
logne, the  Bois  de  Vincennes,  and  various  other  parks, 
squares,  and  gardens,  there  are  almost  innumerable 
privileges  and  concessions  leased  to  individuals  for 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY  77 

sums  which  help  to  make  up  the   grand  total  of     CHAP.  L 
3,500,000  fraiics.     Nor  can  it  be  considered  that  any 
of  this  money  comes  by  way  of  indulgence  for  the 
permission  of  nuisances.     The  newspaper  kiosks,  ad-  An  instance 
vertising  pillars,  refreshment  stands,  and  other  loca-    ^"thrift 
tions  concessiontes,  all  contribute  towards  the  conven- 
ience of  the  people,  and  they  are  not  permitted  to  be 
unsightly.     The  revenue  from  these  sources  is  almost 
entirely  a  net  income,  and  it  aids  materially  in  the 
cost  of  maintaining  streets  and  open  spaces. 

The  parks  of  Paris  are  entitled  to  some  special  men- 
tion, although  for  the  purposes  of  the  people  the 
broad  and  well-cleaned  avenues  with  their  rows  of 
shade-trees  are  to  be  deemed  the  most  important  pro- 
vision for  out-of-door  life  and  recreation.  On  all  the  as  parkways, 
streets  having  a  width  of  twenty  meters  or  more  there 
are  rows  of  shade-trees,  and  most  of  the  broad  thor- 
oughfares have  also  a  middle  strip,  planted  with  trees, 
grass,  and  flowers.  Benches  are  everywhere  provided 
under  the  trees,  and  thus  in  some  sense  the  whole  city 
may  be  considered  a  park.  The  river  and  the  quays 
form  the  most  valuable  of  the  breathing  spaces  of 
Paris.  There  are  nearly  a  hundred  thousand  trees 
along  the  chief  streets ;  and  this  is  a  great  number  shade  trees 
when  account  is  made  of  the  compactness  of  the  city,  avenues. 

The  avenues  and  boulevards  are,  indeed,  considered 
as  a  part  of  the  park  system,  in  so  far  as  they  are 
planted  with  trees  and  provided  with  gardened  strips ; 
and  the  whole  service  of  "promenades  et plantations" 
falls  under  the  supervision  of  the  same  engineer-in- 
chief  who,  as  head  of  a  branch  of  the  public  works  The  park  ad- 
department,  is  also  in  control  of  street  illumination 
and  of  concessions  on  the  vote  publique  and  in  the 
parks.  The  grouping  of  these  tasks  is  a  felicitous  one. 
The  same  oversight  thus  controls  (1)  the  public  parks 
and  gardens  (2)  the  streets  in  their  aspect  as  parkways, 


78 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


The  Bois  de 
Boulogne. 


Advanta- 
geous finan- 
ciering. 


The  Bois  de 


both  streets  and  parks  in  (3)  all  matters  of  illumination, 
and  again  in  (4)  everything  that  concerns  the  erection 
of  booths  or  kiosks,  or  the  granting  of  other  privileges 
on  the  sidewalks  or  in  public  squares  and  gardens. 
Esthetic  harmony  is  thus  assured,  and  much  economy 
of  administration  results. 

Naturally  enough,  when  the  transformation  of  Paris 
was  determined  upon  in  1852,  the  question  of  parks 
was  not  omitted.  It  was  determined  to  make  the  Bois 
de  Boulogne,  lying  immediately  west  of  Paris,  the 
great  pleasure-ground  of  the  new  dispensation,  and  to 
provide  grand  approaches  to  it  in  connection  with  the 
new  boulevard  system.  The  Bois  had  survived  as  part 
of  an  ancient  forest  owned  by  the  state.  But  it  was 
not  improved,  nor  was  it  easy  of  access.  In  1852  the 
state  granted  it  to  the  municipality  of  Paris  on  condi- 
tion that  it  should  be  developed  as  a  modern  park  with- 
out delay.  Fourteen  millions  of  francs  were  soon  ex- 
pended upon  it,  the  larger  part  of  which  was  recovered 
by  advantageous  sales  of  adjacent  building  sites.  As 
finally  adjusted  this  noble  pleasure-ground  contains 
873  hectares  (about  2250  acres),  and  as  the  city's 
suburbs  expand  it  becomes  constantly  more  accessi- 
ble to  a  large  population. 

The  opposite  end  of  Paris  was  similarly  recognized 
by  the  acquisition  from  the  state  in  1860  of  the  Vin- 

«  1-1 

cennes  forest,  upon  which  even  greater  sums  were 
expended.  The  Bois  de  Vincennes  now  contains  943 
hectares  (about  2,400  acres),  and  its  conversion  to 
its  present  attractive  character  involved  an  outlay  in 
the  years  1860-66  of  nearly  24,000,000  francs.  The 
original  grant  was  larger,  but  by  permission  of  the 
state  the  municipality  sold  125  hectares  to  private 
builders  for  about  13,000,000  francs,  and  thus  mate- 
rially reduced  the  cost  to  the  Parisian  taxpayers  of  a 
park  that  is  now  worth  many  scores  of  millions. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  79 

"Within  the  city  limits  the  parks  were  few  in  earlier     CHAP.  i. 
times,  although  the  people  had  some  access  to  several 
old  royal  pleasure-grounds,  chiefly  the  gardens  of  the 

T  i  4.1       rn    -i      •  j   ru      nu  iSi      /          Other  Paris- 

Luxemburg,  the  Tuileries  and  the  Champs  Elysees.     ian  parks. 

There  are  now  nearly  a  hundred  squares,  parks  and 
gardens  open  to  the  people,  most  of  which  are  muni- 
cipal property,  though  a  few  belong  to  the  state. 
The  largest  and  most  picturesque  of  these  is  the  Pare 
des  Buttes-Chaumont  in  the  northeast  of  Paris,  with 
an  extent  of  62  acres,  which  was  completed  among 
the  last  great  works  of  the  Haussmann  period  and 
opened  in  1869.  The  Pare  de  Montsouris  in  the  south 
of  Paris,  which  contains  perhaps  45  acres,  was  opened 
somewhat  earlier.  The  later  endeavors  of  the  admin-  small  parks 
istration  have  been  directed  toward  the  multiplication  "grounds. 
of  small  parks  and  playgrounds  in  the  poorest  and 
densest  quarters  of  the  city ;  and  since  the  beginning 
of  the  third  republic  there  has  been  no  endeavor  to 
add  to  the  number  of  large  parks.  The  operations 
of  the  municipality  as  florist  and  gardener  are  neces- 
sarily on  a  vast  scale ;  and  one  is  tempted  to  dwell  Mnnicipai- 
upon  the  great  establishments  in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  Icai  gardener, 
where  the  nurseries  and  green  houses  are  concentrated 
and  where  youths  from  all  lands  are  sent  to  learn 
floriculture  from  the  accomplished  gardeners  and  bo- 
tanical experts  in  the  service  of  the  Parisian  "  prome- 
nades et  plantations." 

The  use  of  the  voie  publique  of  Paris  for  purposes 
of  transit  by  means  of  street  railways  and  otherwise 
is  a  topic  of  increasing  interest,  and  one  that  is  so   Transitand 
closely  related  to  that  of  the  housing  system  and  of     housing. 
the  territorial  distribution  of  the  inhabitants  that 
both  may  well  be  considered  together.     Paris  in  the 
past  centuries  has  grown  by  concentric  accretions, 
military  defenses  having  determined  from  time  to 


80  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  time  the  municipal  metes  and  bounds.  As  in  many 
another  European  city,  the  encircling  boulevards  re- 
veal  historic  lines  of  bastioned  wall  and  moat,  aban- 
doned in  favor  of  a  new,  outer  cincture.  Any  boldly 
outlined  street  map  of  Paris  shows  readily,  by  the 
division  lines  of  the  arrondissements,  the  more  impor- 
tant successive  perimeters.  Originally  beginning  with 

Historical    the  "  He  de  la  Cite  "  in  the  Seine,  which  still  lies  at 

eofarea.en  the  heart  of  the  metropolis,  Paris  became  in  1180, 
under  Philip  II.  Augustus,  a  round,  walled  city  on  both 
banks  of  the  river,  with  an  area  of  252  hectares  (a 
hectare  is  2.4711  acres).  In  1370  Charles  V.  built  a 
new  wall  on  the  north  side,  and  this  was  further  ex- 
tended on  the  west,  some  three  hundred  years  later, 
so  that  the  city  then  included  567  hectares.  Louis 
XIV.  and  Louis  XV.  made  considerable  annexations, 
but  it  remained  for  the  government  of  Louis  XVI. 
in  the  years  1784-91  to  fix  a  new  line  enclosing  the 
more  generous  space  of  3370  hectares ;  and  this  re- 
mained the  limit  of  the  Paris  municipality  until  1860. 
The  Paris  of  the  Bourbons  was  nearly  round,  and 

Paris  under  was  almost  equally  divided  by  the  river  one  way  and 
thbons!ir  by  the  Boulevards  St.  Michel  and  de  Sebastopol  at 
right  angles  with  the  river,  being  encircled  by  what  is 
now  known  as  the  inner  line  of  Boulevards,  with  the 
Bastile  at  the  extreme  east,  the  Madeleine,  Place  de  la 
Concorde,  and  Hotel  des  Invalides  at  the  extreme 
west,  and  the  Mont  Parnasse  and  Port-Royal  Boule- 
vards marking  the  southern  curve.  Louis  XVI.'s 
great  annexation  included  chiefly  the  districts  lying 
on  the  north  side  of  the  river  between  the  inner  and 
outer  lines  of  boulevards,  an  accretion  veiy  distinctly 
indicated  on  the  map.  This  area  remained  without 

cations,  and  change  until  January  1,  1860.  The  government  had 
.  constructed  after  1841  the  present  girdle  of  fortifica- 
tions, and  it  wag  inevitable  that  this  should  sooner  or 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


81 


later  become  the  boundary  line  of  the  city.  The  new 
limits  were  established  by  the  law  of  1859.  At  that 
time  the  existing  limits  of  the  arrondissements  were 
fixed,  the  old  area  being  divided  into  what  are  known 
as  the  ten  inner  arrondissements,  and  the  annexed 
districts,  or  "faubourgs,"  with  adjacent  parts  of  the 
inner  city,  into  the  ten  outer  arrondissements,  each 
one  being  given  a  name  and  a  number.  At  the  same 
time  each  arrondissement  was  divided  into  four  quar- 
ters, each  of  which  was  named. 

The  Paris  of  1790  contained  a  population  of  600,000, 
the  area  now  comprised  in  the  outer  ten  arrondisse- 
ments being  rural,  with  only  ten  or  fifteen  thousand 
people.  At  the  time  of  the  annexation  in  1860,  as 
shown  by  the  census  of  1861,  the  inner  ten  divisions 
had  more  than  900,000  people,  and  the  outer  ten  more 
than  700,000,  a  total  exceeding  1,600,000.  It  is  ex- 
tremely interesting  to  follow  the  subsequent  develop- 
ment of  population.  The  inner  ten  divisions  actually 
lost  more  than  30,000  people  in  the  decade  from  1861 
to  1871,  a  period  in  which  great  demolitions  and 
street  improvements  were  made ;  and  in  the  same  de- 
cade the  outer  ten  divisions  gained  more  than  200,000 
people.  From  1871  to  1881  the  inner  ten  gained 
116,000,  while  the  outer  ten  gained  300,000.  From 
1881  to  1886  the  inner  ten  lost  18,000  and  the  outer 
ten  gained  94,000.  The  net  result  of  the  twenty-five 
years  from  1861  to  1886  was  a  gain  of  64,845  for  the 
inner  ten  arrondissemeuts  and  of  611,850  for  the  outer 
ten,  the  one  half  having  1,010,970  people,  and  the 
other  1,330,580,  a  grand  total  of  2,344,550.  By  the 
census  of  1891,  the  total  population  was  2,447,957  —  a 
gain  in  five  years  of  103,407,  practically  all  of  which 
must  be  credited  to  the  outer  ten. 

Obviously  the  inner  divisions  have  reached  their 
maximum  inhabitancy.  "What  we  may  call  the  old 


CHAP.  I. 


Growth  of 

population 

in  the  old 

limits. 


Rise  of  the 
outer  zone. 


82 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Progress  of 
the  new 
suburbs. 


The  actual 

defenses  of 

Paris. 


Area  of  the 
department 
of  the  Seine. 


Paris  has  for  fifty  years  had  a  population  averaging 
about  1,000,000 ;  and  there  have  been  added  1,500,000 
more  people,  occupying  the  belt  of  arrondisseinents 
inside  the  fortifications,  the  Paris  of  to-day  having 
more  than  2,500,000  inhabitants. 

Meanwhile  the  suburban  population  outside  the 
fortifications  has  been  growing  rapidly.  The  little 
communes  of  the  department  of  the  Seine,  outside  of 
Paris,  are  grouped  in  the  two  arrondisseinents  of  Saint 
Denis  and  Sceaux.  Altogether  this  exterior  belt  had 
a  population  of  about  255,000  in  1861,  which  had 
grown  to  more  than  600,000  in  1886,  was  nearly  700,- 
000  in  1891,  and  will  within  a  few  years  have  reached 
a  full  million. 

It  only  remains  to  tear  away  the  line  of  fortifica- 
tions, and  to  fill  up  the  great  ditch,  in  order  to  permit 
the  city  to  expand  freely  under  the  impetus  of  the 
modern  suburban  tendency.  The  real  military  defen- 
ses of  Paris  now  take  the  form  of  two  lines  of  en- 
trenched camps  and  forts,  one  of  which  is  at  an 
average  distance  of  three  or  four  miles  outside  the 
wall  of  cincture  that  forms  the  city  limits,  while  the 
other  and  more  formidable  one  is  yet  several  miles 
further  distant.  The  existing  Paris  covers  19,275 
acres,  orab  out  thirty  square  miles,  within  which  are 
housed  more  than  2,500,000  people.  The  average  dis- 
tance from  center  to  circumference  is  only  three  miles. 
The  department  of  the  Seine,  at  the  center  of  which 
Paris  lies,  contains  nearly  184  square  miles,  including 
Paris,  and  its  outer  edges  lie  at  an  average  distance 
of  only  seven  or  eight  miles  from  the  center  of  the 
metropolis,  or  from  four  to  five  miles  beyond  the  ex- 
isting city  limits.  Inasmuch  as  the  whole  department 
is  already  under  the  administrative  direction  of  the 
two  prefects  who  administer  Paris,  while  the  council- 
general  of  the  department  consists  of  the  Paris 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


83 


municipal  council  with  the  addition  of  a  handful  of 
men  from  the  two  extra-mural  arrondissements,  noth- 
ing would  seem  easier  than  a  complete  assimilation  of 
the  government  system.  And  since  the  cincture  de- 
fenses are  obsolete  for  military  purposes,  every  sound 
argument  demands  their  removal,  to  be  followed  by 
annexation  of  the  whole  suburban  belt  to  the  munici- 
pality. Such  a  project  is  under  consideration,  and  its 
accomplishment  is  only  a  question  of  time.  The  line 
of  fortifications  will  afford  a  magnificent  opportunity 
for  effective  boulevards  and  public  gardens,  while  also 
permitting  the  sale  of  several  hundred  million  francs' 
worth  of  building  sites.  This  improvement,  accom- 
panied as  it  would  inevitably  be  by  a  development  of 
improved  transit  systems  and  the  rapid  up-building  of 
the  suburbs,  will  quite  probably  be  decided  upon  by 
the  state  and  the  municipality  as  the  closing  and 
crowning  event  of  the  century  in  the  history  of  the 
grands  travaux  de  Paris. 

The  metropolitan  London  houses  a  population  of 
4,230,000  (census  of  1891)  within  an  area  of  123  square 
miles  —  an  average  of  34,400  to  the  square  mile,  while 
within  the  30  square  miles  of  Paris  there  are  2,500,- 
000  people,  or  83,300  to  the  square  mile.  This  is  a 
high  degree  of  density,  although  it  does  not  follow 
that  the  people  of  London,  living  in  houses  of  two  or 
three  stories,  with  an  average  of  eight  persons  per 
house,  are  better  housed  or  less  crowded  than  the 
Parisians  who  occupy  large  tenement  houses  of  four 
or  five  stories,  with  an  average  of  30  persons  to  the 
house.  In  Manhattan  Island  (New  York  City),  accord- 
ing to  the  census  of  1890,  the  density  per  square  mile 
was  73,300.  But  for  several  of  the  most  crowded 
wards  of  New  York  the  density  averaged  more  than 
300,000  per  square  mile,  which  is  far  in  excess  of  any- 
thing to  be  found  in  corresponding  areas  of  Paris  or 


CHAP.  I. 


Reasons  for 
amalgama- 
tion of  de- 
partment 
and  city. 


An  oppor- 
tunity for 
additional 
"  grands 
travaux." 


Parisian  den- 
sity com- 
pared with 
London's. 


Compared 
with  that  of 
New  York. 


84  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.     London,  where  there  is  a  comparatively  even  distri- 

With       bution  throughout  the  municipal  area.     Brooklyn  in 

Brooklyn's.    1890,  in  a  municipal  territory  of  26£  square  miles, 

(somewhat  less  than  that  of  Paris)  accommodated 

806,000  people,  or  about  30,500  to  the  square  mile. 

Chicago,  with  160  square  miles  and  a  population  in 

Chicago's.     1890  of  1,100,000,  could  boast  an  average  of  only  6850 

to  the  square  mile.    But  Chicago's  central  wards  have 

nearly  ten  times  that  density,  and  may  be  regarded  as 

accommodating  from  60,000  to  75,000  people  per  square 

the  heart  of  mile,  while  Philadelphia  and  Boston,  as  well  as  Brook- 

Philadelphia    .  .       *      .  '  . 

and  Boston,  lyn,  are  housing  in  their  densest  districts  a  population 
that  averages  100,000  to  the  square  mile.  The  re- 
markable fact  about  the  Parisian  density  is  its  high 
average  for  the  entire  city,  in  which  regard  it  has  no 
equal.  It  is  a  marvelously  compact  system  of  hous- 
ing that  provides  for  2,500,000  people  within  a  circle 
whose  radius  is  only  three  miles. 

All  these  considerations  bear  vitally  upon  the  ques- 
tion of  transit.     The  people  of  inner  Paris  have  not, 

Relation  of  as  a  rule,  far  to  be  transported  from  their  work.  Very 
transit.0  many  of  them  live  on  the  etages  above  their  shops 
and  business  places.  Instead  of  taking  street  cars  or 
omnibuses  to  go  home,  they  simply  walk  up-stairs ; 
and  similar  statements  might  be  made  for  the  major 
part  of  the  population  of  the  outer  arrondissements. 
Every  quarter  of  the  city  is  at  once  a  business  quarter 
and  a  residence  quarter.  Nevertheless,  as  the  city 
grows  in  its  outer  districts,  and  as  population  rapidly 
increases  in  the  suburbs  beyond  the  gates,  there  is  an 
enhanced  regular  daily  movement  to  and  from  the 

New  impor-  °  J  . 

tance  of      central  arrondissements  where  the  principal  business 
Paris.       operations  are  massed.     Thus  the  transit  question 
assumes  constantly  increasing  importance  in  Paris,  as 
in  the  other  large  cities  of  the  world. 

There  are  two  kinds  of  municipal  transit  that  must 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  85 

be  recognized,  just  as  there  are  two  kinds  of  streets  CHAP.  i. 
in  the  great  European  cities.  These  cities  have  (1) 
their  network  of  minor  streets,  and  (2)  their  system 
of  great  thoroughfares  and  boulevards  pertaining  to 
the  metropolis  as  a  whole.  Analogously,  they  have 
their  systems  of  strictly  local  street  transit,  by  cabs, 
street  railways,  and  omnibuses,  and  their  more  rapid 
system  of  what  may  be  called  metropolitan  transit. 
It  is  this  latter  system  that  great  cities  are  most  ear-  tan  systems 
nestly  discussing  in  the  closing  years  of  the  century.  °  tran?it.ger 
In  London  it  takes  the  form  of  the  underground  rail- 
ways and  of  innumerable  suburban  trains  on  all  the 
great  railway  lines.  In  New  York  and  Brooklyn  it 
has  its  beginning  in  the  elevated  railway  system,  and 
is  to  have  great  extensions  in  the  early  future,  in  part 
by  means  of  underground  electric  roads.  In  several 
American  cities  the  surface  lines  of  cable  and  electric 
street  railways  are  made  to  answer  temporarily  the 
double  purpose  of  local  and  metropolitan  lines.  But 
Paris,  thus  far,  has  developed  no  metropolitan  system  Yet  to  be 
at  all  except  the  belt  line,  the  Chemin  de  Per  de  d?oreltheed 
Ceinture,  The  density  of  its  population  and  the  Parisians- 
prevalence  of  high  houses,  as  I  have  shown,  sufficiently 
explain  the  tardiness  of  this  great  capital  in  such 
matters.  The  local  systems  of  transit,  by  cabs,  omni- 
buses, and  tram-cars,  have  had  a  steady  development 
in  Paris,  however,  and  for  a  number  of  years  the 
public  authorities  and  skilled  engineers  have  been 
anticipating  the  necessity  of  a  metropolitan  rapid 
transit  system  and  have  given  the  subject  a  vast 
amount  of  study  and  discussion.  The  consequence  is 
that  important  beginnings  seem  about  to  be  made, 
and  after  an  account  of  the  existing  transit  arrange- 
ments I  shall  refer  to  these  new  proposals. 

All  kinds  of  passenger  transportation  in  Paris  have 
always  been  strictly  supervised  by  the  authorities. 

6* 


86 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


History  of 
omnibus 
system. 


Terms  of 
franchise. 


Introduction 
of  street 
railways. 


Payments  to 
municipal 
treasury. 


The  omnibus  system  of  the  metropolis  became  im- 
portant early  in  the  century.  In  1854,  by  arrange- 
ment with  the  administration,  fifteen  existing  omnibus 
lines  became  absorbed  in  the  Compagnie  Generate 
des  Omnibus,  to  which  an  exclusive  franchise  was 
given  for  thirty  years  upon  condition  of  large  annual 
payments  to  the  city — a  franchise  that  was  renewed 
after  the  enlargement  of  the  city  in  1860,  and  was 
then  extended  to  the  year  1910.  Under  the  plan  of 
1854  the  company  was  required  to  pay  the  city  640,000 
francs  a  year,  with  additional  sums  for  each  vehicle 
exceeding  350.  By  the  arrangement  of  1860,  which  is 
still  in  force,  the  company  agreed  to  pay  1,000,000 
francs  a  year  (which  was  at  the  rate  of  2000  francs 
apiece  for  500  vehicles),  and  to  pay  in  addition,  for 
every  omnibus  used  beyond  the  number  of  500,  an 
annual  fee  of  1000  francs  until  1871,  to  be  increased 
to  1500  francs  from  1871  to  1886,  and  thereafter  to 
be  fixed  at  2000  francs.  Thus  the  present  payment 
is  2000  francs  each  for  every  omnibus  in  use,  and  the 
number  actually  in  use  for  a  number  of  years  has 
somewhat  exceeded  600.  After  1873,  street  railways 
were  introduced,  and  those  of  inner  Paris  were  con- 
structed and  operated  by  the  Compagnie  Gen6rale 
des  Omnibus  as  an  added  part  of  its  business,  its  street- 
railway  franchises  also  extending  to  the  year  1910. 
The  company  pays  into  the  city  treasury  1500  francs 
per  year  for  each  tram-car  on  its  lines,  and  it  has 
about  300  in  operation.  There  are  also  two  other 
street-railway  companies  operating  in  the  newer  and 
suburban  parts  of  Paris,  one  system  on  the  north  side 
and  the  other  on  the  south ;  the  southern  system  pay- 
ing the  city  1500  francs  a  year  for  each  car,  and  the 
northern  system  paying  750  francs  per  car. 

The  omnibuses  and  street  cars  of  Paris  are  absurdly 
large,  ponderous,  and  slow,  but  they  are  operated 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


87 


upon  the  most  methodical  system  in  the  world.  The 
routes  and  halting-places  are  precisely  denned,  and 
along  each  route  is  a  series  of  neat  stations  built  upon 
the  sidewalk.  Everything  pertaining  to  the  size  and 
construction  of  the  vehicles  and  the  station-houses; 
to  the  style  of  rails  and  placing  of  tracks ;  to  the  ar- 
rangement, change,  and  addition  of  routes;  to  the 
prices  charged  and  the  transfers  given  ;  and  to  almost 
every  other  imaginable  detail  affecting  the  business, 
is  prescribed  by  the  public  authorities.  Upon  the 
principle  employed  in  dealing  with  the  gas  company 
as  a  chartered  monopoly,  the  city  has  a  right,  after 
prescribed  dividends  and  all  public  charges  and  pri- 
vate expenses  are  paid,  to  one  half  of  the  surplus  prof- 
its of  the  Compagnie  des  Omnibus  et  des  Tramways', 
but  thus  far  little  has  been  realized  from  contingent 
profits.  The  Compagnie  G6nerale  transported  in  its 
omnibuses  in  1893  more  than  126,000,000  passengers, 
and  in  its  tram-cars  more  than  86,000,000.  Its  busi- 
ness had  grown  from  108,750,000  passengers  in  1872 
to  215,000,000  in  1889.  The  other  two  tramway  com- 
panies transported  some  27,000,000  passengers  each 
in  1893,  making  a  grand  total  for  Paris  of  126,000,000 
passengers  carried  by  omnibus  and  140,000,000  car- 
ried by  street  railway.  These  are  not  large  figures 
when  compared  with  corresponding  ones  for  American 
cities;  but  it  is  worth  while  to  remind  American 
readers  that  the  Parisian  transit  companies  pay  more 
than  2,000,000  francs  a  year  to  the  city  treasury  as  a 
rental  for  the  privileges  they  enjoy  on  the  streets. 

Nearly  all  the  cabs  and  public  carnages  of  Paris 
belong  to  one  great  company, —  the  Compagnie 
Generate  des  Voitures  de  Pan's,  —  which  has  about 
8000  vehicles  in  use.  For  the  use  of  the  public  cab- 
stands, and  their  license  to  do  business,  each  carriage 
must  pay  an  annual  license  fee  of  365  francs — a  franc 


CHAP.  I. 


Details 

strictly 

regulated. 


Half  the  sur- 
plus profits 
go  to  the 
city. 


Volume  of 
business. 


Control  of 
cab  system. 


88 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


A  costly 
withdrawal. 


CHAP.  i.     per  diem.     In  1855,  following  the  example   of  the 

Cornpagiiie  Generale  des  Omnibus  and  the  fusion  of 

the  gas  companies,  monopolies  being  the  fashion, 

special  privileges  were  accorded  to  a  great  cab  com- 

A  monopoly   pany  that  was  formed  to  absorb  numerous  small  pro- 

cfll)  frSiii- 

cinse.  prietorships;  and  in  1862  this  company  obtained  an 
exclusive  franchise  for  the  use  of  cabs  and  public 
carriages  throughout  the  enlarged  municipality,  upon 
the  basis  of  a  payment  to  the  city  of  one  franc  per 
day  for  each  vehicle,  and  of  a  division  with  the  city 
of  the  surplus  profits,  as  provided  in  the  contracts 
with  the  gas  and  omnibus  companies, —  the  patrons 
being  protected  by  a  fixed  scale  of  charges  and  a 
minute  code  of  regulations.  But  this  monopoly  was 
not  deemed  advantageous,  and  the  exclusive  privilege 
was  revoked  in  1866.  To  the  surprise  and  indignation  of 
the  city  government,  the  cab  company  obtained  a  judi- 
cial award  of  damages  to  the  amount  of  300,000  francs 
per  year  for  each  of  the  remaining  forty-seven  years  of 
the  original  fifty-year  grant.  That  excessive  award  has 
of  course  given  the  company  an  advantage  over  all 
competitors,  and  it  has  steadily  grown.  Since  1866 
the  cab  business  has  been  free  to  all  applicants,  sub- 
ject to  the  laws  regulating  the  details  of  the  service, 
and  the  fee  has  remained  at  365  francs  a  year.  There 
are  about  10,000  public  carriages  in  Paris,  of  which 
four  fifths  belong  to  the  Compagnie  Generale  des  Voi- 
tures.  The  annual  receipts  of  the  city  from  cab  licenses 
reach  3,700,000  francs ;  and  the  total  receipts  under 
the  head  of  voitures  publiques  (the  street-railway  and 
omnibus  payments  being  included)  amount  to  about 
6,000,000  francs.  In  the  past  ten  years,  therefore, 
Paris  has  received  nearly  60,000,000  francs  as  rentals 
and  license  fees  from  companies  and  individuals  using 
the  streets  for  passenger  transportation.  Undoubt- 
edly for  a  number  of  years  past  the  city  council  has 


Total  re- 
ceipts from 

public 
vehicles. 


PARIS:   THE   TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


89 


not  been  especially  friendly  to  the  great  monopoly 
companies  of  Paris,  and  it  would  be  more  than  willing 
to  have  some  of  them  superseded  by  a  system  of 
direct  municipal  operation.  But  conservative  public 
opinion  prefers  the  existing  arrangements,  and  assur- 
edly they  are  not  disadvantageous.  What  is  espe- 
cially needed  in  transportation  facilities  is  a  very' 
great  extension  of  the  street  railways  and  omnibus 
lines,  with  the  introduction  of  small  vehicles  and  a 
far  more  frequent  and  rapid  service.  The  existing 
system  of  licenses,  that  puts  a  penalty  upon  an  increase 
in  the  number  of  tram-cars  and  omnibuses,  is  clearly 
a  wrong  one. 

But  in  addition  to  these  facilities  for  local  transit, 
Paris  needs  a  metropolitan  system.  I  have  referred 
to  the  belt  railway.  It  follows  the  perimeter  of  the 
city  just  inside  the  fortifications.  It  is  primarily  a 
line  for  the  connection  of  the  great  railways  entering 
Paris.  Only  one  of  these  roads  has  its  passenger 
station  conveniently  near  the  center  of  the  city,  and 
the  transfer  of  goods  and  passengers  has  been  ex- 
tremely inconvenient.  The  girdle  line  also  serves, 
however,  for  a  considerable  amount  of  ordinary  local 
transportation  of  passengers,  and  may  be  deemed  part 
of  a  system  of  metropolitan  rapid  transit.  For  the 
completion  of  such  a  system  several  elaborate  plans 
have  at  different  times  been  worked  out  under  the 
auspices  of  government  and  municipal  engineers. 
Some  have  been  plans  for  underground  and  others, 
for  elevated  lines.  But  all  have  involved  great  expen- 
ditures, and  called  for  heavy  subsidies  or  guaranties.. 
It  is  probable  that  the  final  judgment  will  be  given 
in  favor  of  an  electric  underground  system  connect- 
ing the  chief  railway-stations  and  combining  an  inner- 
circuitous  line,  following  the  boulevards,  with  lines 
across  the  city  from  east  to  west  and  from  north  to 


CHAP.  I. 


The  Paris 
system  of 
monopoly 

companies. 


The  girdle 
railway. 


A.  probable 
electric 

underground 
system. 


90 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


The  building 
regulations. 


Height 
strictly 
limited. 


Harmony 
required. 


Houses  and 
health. 


south.  The  abolition  of  the  present  municipal  limits 
will  be  the  signal  for  a  new  transit  system,  for  a  re- 
duction of  the  density  of  the  existing  city,  and  for  a 
rapid  overflow  of  population  into  the  broad  outer 
zone  to  be  annexed. 

Allusions  have  already  been  made  to  those  laws 
governing  construction  which  have  secured  for  Paris- 
ian street  architecture  its  air  of  regularity.  The 
height  of  buildings  had  always  been  a  matter  of  pub- 
He  regulation,  but  it  became  necessary  in  the  Hauss- 
niann  period  very  greatly  to  revise  the  entire  code  of 
building  rules.  Many  buildings  were  destroyed  in  the 
terrible  weeks  of  the  siege  and  commune  (1871),  and 
the  building  laws  were  again  revised  and  improved 
in  1872  to  meet  the  exigencies  of  a  period  of  unusual 
activity  in  construction.  Buildings  of  great  height 
have  never  been  tolerated  in  Paris.  The  avenues, 
boulevards,  and  principal  streets  have  been  lined  with 
houses  under  rules  which  fixed  the  maximum  height 
of  facades  at  20  meters  (65£  feet),  which  have  pre- 
scribed the  number  of  stories,  and  which,  above  all 
things,  have  compelled  private  builders  to  observe  for 
any  given  street,  in  the  language  of  the  law,  the 
"  raccordement  et  1'harmonie  des  lignes  de  construc- 
tion." The  laws  also  require  the  periodical  repair  or 
repainting  of  all  fa9ades,  to  assure  the  neat  and  fresh 
appearance  of  every  street. 

If  in  the  earlier  part  of  the  Napoleon-Haussmann 
era  it  was  the  outward  aspect  of  the  city's  houses  that 
was  chiefly  regarded  by  the  administration,  there 
came  a  gradual  recognition  of  the  necessity  for  care- 
ful regulation  of  interior  construction,  particularly 
from  the  point  of  view  of  the  public  health.  For,  to 
speak  sweepingly,  all  houses  are  tenement-houses  in 
Paris,  and  unquestionably  it  belongs  to  the  genius 
of  Parisian  administration  to  regulate  minutely  the 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


91 


arrangement  and  the  occupancy  of  such  structures.     CHAP.I. 
The  remaking  of  Paris  streets,  and  the  acquisition  of 
the  lie  de  la  Cite  and  other  central  areas  for  public 
buildings,  resulted  in  the  clearing  away^of  many  an-  Clearanceof 
cient  and  unwholesome  slum  houses ;  and  the  whole       slums. 
spirit  of  these  modern  reforms  has  been  favorable  to 
an  improvement  of  the  housing  conditions  of  the 
masses.    Nevertheless,  there  have  survived  in  Paris 
great  numbers  of  objectionable  houses,  against  which 
the  health  authorities  have  had  to  make  unceasing 
war. 

The  methods  pursued  in  this  administrative  crusade 
against  unsanitary  conditions  of  every  character  in 
the  homes  of  the  people  have  been  too  little  known  in 
the  English-speaking  countries.  They  have  been  re- 
markably efficient.  For  several  decades  there  has 
existed  a  permanent  special  body  of  experts  charged 
with  the  constant  supervision  of  this  one  subject.  It 
is  entitled  the  Commission  des  Logements  Insalubres. 
It  is  composed  of  thirty  members,  ten  of  whom  are 
appointed  every  two  years  by  the  municipal  council, 
the  term  being  six  years,  and  reappointments  natu- 
rally being  the  rule.  The  members  of  this  commis- 
sion, apart  from  the  prefect  of  the  Seine,  wh,o  is  ex- 
officio  president,  are  not  public  functionaries,  but  are 
as  a  rule  well-known  citizens  —  physicians,  architects, 
engineers,  and  men  who,  for  one  reason  or  another, 
are  especially  qualified  to  pass  upon  questions  relat- 
ing to  the  hygiene  and  construction  of  houses.  The 
commission  usually  meets  weekly.  Its  members 
live  in  various  parts  of  the  city,  and  look  promptly 
into  all  complaints.  They  do  not  make  investigations 
except  upon  receipt  of  complaints,  because  there 
exist  various  and  ample  agencies  of  official  inspec- 
tion in  all  the  arrondissements,  and  because  all  ten- 
ants are  instructed  that  they  may  at  any  time  send  by 


The  "  com- 
mission des 
logements 
insalubres." 


Expert 
membership. 


92 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Operations 

in  twenty 

years. 


CHAP.  i.  mail  an  unsigned  complaint  calling  attention  to  the 
condition  of  the  building  in  which  they  live.  The 

Methods  of  ..  -, ,  -.    .     .        -.      .  ,          , 

the  board,  commission  acts  upon  all  complaints,  decides  the  na- 
ture and  extent  of  repairs  that  should  be  made,  or 
designates  as  uninhabitable  the  houses  that  are  be- 
yond reclamation.  Its  reports  go  to  the  municipal 
council,  which  as  a  rule  confirms  all  its  recommenda- 
tions. The  owner  has  a  right  to  be  heard,  but  the 
judgments  of  the  commission  carry  prestige,  and  are 
seldom  reversed. 

In  the  twenty  years  from  1872  to  1892  the  commis- 
sion had  secured  sanitary  improvements  in  the  case 
of  about  fifteen  thousand  houses,  and  it  must  be  re- 
membered that  most  of  these  were  buildings  lodging 
a  number  of  families,  so  that  nearly  half  a  million 
people  were  more  or  less  immediately  affected.  The 
members  of  the  commission  are  not  paid  salaries,  but 
receive  an  attendance  fee  of  ten  francs  for  each  meet- 
ing, and  a  further  fee  for  each  written  report  that 
they  make  upon  houses  in  their  respective  districts. 
The  salutary  results  of  such  an  organization,  always 
ready  to  act,  can  hardly  be  overestimated. 

But  .this  commission  on  unhealthful  houses  is  an 
executive  body  devoted  to  a  single  feature  of  sanitary 
administration.  The  great  central  source  of  scien- 
tific authority  upon  all  the  questions  that  relate  to  the 
public  health  is  the  Conseil  d'Hygiene  et  de  SaliibriU. 
It  is  a  board  of  health  of  the  highest  possible  pres- 
tige, which  dates  from  the  year  1802.  The  prefect  of 
police  presides  over  it,  and  besides  some  twenty-four 
life  members  who  are  specially  appointed  for  their 
high  attainments,  and  who  must  be  confirmed  by  the 
general  government,  there  are  ex-officio  seats  in  the 
council  for  such  men  as  the  dean  of  the  faculty  of 
membership,  medicine  in  the  University  of  Paris,  the  professors  of 


The  sanitary 
council. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  93 

hygiene  and  legal  medicine  in  the  same  faculty,  the  CHAP.  i. 
director  of  the  college  of  pharmacy,  the  president  of 
the  army  sanitary  board,  the  director  of  Parisian 
public  works,  two  chief  engineers  holding  high  official 
posts  at  Paris,  two  members  of  the  municipal  council, 
the  head  of  the  veterinary  health  service  of  the  de- 
partment, a  chief  architect,  and  several  high  police 
officials.  The  ex-officio  membership  gives  assurance  of 
much  special  and  expert  talent,  while  in  point  of  fact 
the  life  appointments  are  also  made  as  marks  of  high 
honor  for  eminence  in  the  world  of  professional  and  four  life 
scientific  knowledge.  This  magnificent  Council  of  Pub- 
lic Health  is  an  advisory  rather  than  an  administra- 
tive body.  It  sets  the  standards,  and  affords  the  actual 

.  An  advisory 

administrative  authorities  the  best  attainable  enlight-  body, 
enment  upon  methods  and  principles.  It  is  consulted 
upon  the  treatment  of  epidemics  ;  upon  the  organiza- 
tion of  medical  relief;  upon  questions  of  health  re- 
lating to  workshops,  schools,  and  various  institutions; 
upon  the  best  ways  to  prevent  adulteration  of  food 
supplies ;  upon  the  sanitation  of  new  public  buildings, 

"    .    ,  .,  ,.  ,        V     Wide  range 

and  the  principles  of  sanitary  construction  to  be  ob-  of  its  topics. 
served  in  private  buildings ;  upon  the  scientific  aspects 
of  water-supply,  drainage,  and  cemetery  management ; 
and,  in  short,  upon  every  question  as  it  arises  that 
pertains  in  any  general  sense  to  the  health  of  the 
community.  The  body  assembles  twice  a  month, 
and  the  life  members  receive  an  attendance  fee  of 
fifty  francs,  only  ten  francs  being  paid  as  a  jeton  de 
presence  to  the  ex-officio  members. 

This  central  health  council  has  the  important  ad- 
vantage of  the  cooperation  of  twenty  local  boards  of  The  twenty 
health  (commissions  d'kygtene)  established  in  the  ar- 
rondissements.  Here,  again,  one  finds  that  recogni- 
tion  of  neighborhood  life  which  I  have  already  dwelt 
upon  as  so  characteristic  a  part  of  the  administration 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i.  of  Paris.  The  maire  in  each  arrondissement  presides 
over  the  local  health  board,  which  must  meet  at  least 
once  every  month  to  consider  the  sanitary  condition 
of  the  district.  Nine  members,  appointed  for  six 
years  (three  retiring  every  two  years),  constitute  the 
board,  with  the  maire  as  tenth  member  and  president. 
The  board  itself  proposes  three  names  for  each  va- 
cancy, and  the  prefect  of  police  selects  a  man  from 
the  list  thus  offered.  Each  of  these  arrondissement 

Qualifies-     health  boards  must  contain  at  least  two  physicians, 

tionsfor  ,  .    ,  .  ' 

membership,  one  pharmacist,  one  veterinary  surgeon,  one  archi- 
tect, and  one  engineer  or  technical  head  of  a  manu- 
facturing establishment.  The  boards  are  in  position 
to  know  familiarly  the  general  state  of  health  in  their 
own  divisions  of  Paris,  and  are  of  immense  service  in 
all  times  of  emergency, — their  most  important  work 
having  to  do  with  measures  against  the  spread  of 
epidemic  diseases.  They  are  also  active  in  the  work 
of  reporting  unsanitary  houses  to  the  central  commis- 
sion on  logements  insalubres.  They  have  assigned  to 
them  important  duties  of  statistical  inquiry  and  col- 
lation, and  they  make  frequent  reports  to  the  prefect 
of  police,  who  in  turn  refers  everything  to  the  central 
health  board,  under  the  auspices  of  which  the  health 
statistics  of  the  city  as  a  whole  are  compiled. 

There  is  a  central  sanitary  bureau  in  the  prefecture 
of  police,  which  supervises  the  active  administration  of 
all  the  health  laws,  by  means  of  numerous  active 
agents  belonging  to  the  special  service  of  sanitary 
police.  Since  1884  there  has  been  a  rapid  develop- 
ment of  the  municipal  disinfection  service,  which  is 
organized  for  the  prompt  cleansing  of  domiciles  in 
which  there  have  been  cases  of  infectious  disease,  and 

Disinfection        .  .   .       ,  ...  •  «    -,•   •     n      ,•  ,• 

service,  which  also  maintains  a  series  of  disinfecting  stations 
provided  with  modern  ovens  and  other  appliances  for 
the  thorough  treatment  of  articles  brought  in  sealed 


Sanitary 
police. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


95 


CHAP.  I. 


Epidemic 
hospitals. 


vans  from  infected  homes.  The  removal  of  cases  of 
infectious  disease  to  special  hospitals  is  not  so  general 
in  Paris  as  in  some  other  cities,  although  it  is  becom- 
ing more  frequent.  The  epidemic  hospitals  of  Paris 
are  not  managed  separately  as  a  part  of  the  sanitary 
administration,  but  belong  to  the  general  system  of 
hospitals  controlled  by  that  distinct  branch  of  admin- 
istration known  as  assistance  publique,  that  is  to  say, 
poor  relief,  or  public  charity.  There  are  historic 
reasons  for  the  existing  arrangement,  but  plain  logic 
and  the  highest  efficiency  would  seem  to  require  that 
hospitals  for  the  isolation  of  epidemic  maladies  should 
be  wholly  removed,  in  management  as  well  as  in  loca- 
tion, from  the  ordinary  hospitals  of  public  charity 
and  private  beneficence. 

Few  problems  closely  related  to  the  health  and 
welfare  of  the  community  have  been  more  difficult  The  problem 
for  Parisians  to  solve  conclusively  than  that  of  the  teries. 
cemeteries.  Habitude  and  prejudice  increase  tenfold 
the  perplexities  which  would  in  any  case  be  formida- 
ble enough.  Paris  is  a  very  ancient  city,  and  many 
millions  of  people  have  died  within  its  narrow  limits. 
Custom  of  the  most  obstinate  sort,  about  which  many 
institutions  and  observances  have  grown  up,  has  re- 
quired the  interment  of  the  dead  within  easy  walking 
distance.  A  long  time  ago  it  was  ordained  that  ceme- 
teries must  be  closed  within  the  city  limits,  excepting 
as  Pere  Lachaise  and  several  other  well-known  bury- 
ing-grounds  continue  to  be  used  by  families  who  hold 
perpetual  concessions  in  them.  But  all  attempts  to 
solve  the  problem  by  the  acquisition  of  a  very  large 
new  cemetery  at  some  distance  from  the  city,  to  be 
reached  by  a  special  railway,  were  futile  because  the 
people  would  not  change  their  customs.  The  ceme- 
teries in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  municipal  limits 
have  been  somewhat  extended,  and  the  same  plots  of 


Persistence 
of  custom. 


96 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


The  munici- 
pal crema- 
tory. 


A  report  on 

relation  of 

cemeteries 

to  public 

health. 


Funerals  an 

ecclesiastical 

monopoly. 


ground  are  used  over  and  over  again  every  five  years, 
in  a  manner  not  pleasant  to  contemplate. 

A  few  years  ago,  after  many  previous  refusals,  the 
French  chambers  enacted  a  law  permitting  cremation 
in  Paris,  and  the  municipal  council  at  once  established 
a  crematory  in  the  Pere  Lachaise  cemetery.  An  elab- 
orate system  of  regulations  has  been  devised,  and 
cremation  is  constantly  growing  in  favor.  Perhaps 
three  thousand  cremations  a  year  would  be  as  high 
an  average  as  could  be  claimed  for  the  years  from 
1890  to  1895.  The  municipality  is  disposed  to  en- 
courage this  modern  innovation  so  far  as  possible; 
and  when  the  popular  prejudice  against  it  has  yielded 
somewhat  there  can  be  little  doubt  of  its  rapid  gain. 

Meanwhile  the  health  board  had  begun  exhaustive 
scientific  inquiries  into  the  effect  of  the  existing  ceme- 
teries upon  sanitary  conditions;  and  it  has  made  a 
report  that  is  unexpectedly  lenient  and  optimistic. 
The  cemeteries  are  wholly  municipal,  and  the  service 
is  a  thoroughly  organized  one,  with  a  central  business 
bureau  in  the  prefecture  of  the  Seine,  and  a  chief 
coniroleur  of  the  service.  It  is  well  managed  from 
the  financial  point  of  view,  and  productive  of  net 
revenue. 

The  whole  conduct  of  funerals  in  Paris  has  been 
assigned  to  the  churches  as  a  monopoly  under  the 
control  of  a  central  board  known  as  the  Conseil  d  'Ad- 
ministration du  Service  des  Pompes  Funebres.  The 
vestries  of  the  Catholic  churches  elect  ten  members 
of  this  board,  the  two  leading  Protestant  communions 
have  each  a  representative,  and  the  Jewish  synod  has 
one.  The  Archbishop  of  Paris  appoints  a  vicar-gen- 
eral as  a  member,  and  the  chief  municipal  inspector 
of  funerals  has  a  seat.  This  ecclesiastical  monopoly 
deals  in  all  the  paraphernalia  of  funerals,  from  the 
simplest  to  the  most  elaborate ;  maintains,  for  instance, 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  97 

a  vast  stock  of  coffins,  and  collects  its  bills  in  accor-     CHAP.  i. 
dance  with  a  minute  scale  of  charges  that  has  the 
sanction  of  law.    A  large  amount  of  money  is  in- 
vested in  a  wholesale  stock  of  funeral  goods  by  the 
syndicate  of  the  vestries.     This  monopoly  arrange-  Itgb 
ment  was  established  in  1878,  and  it  has  a  collective     methods. 
income  of  perhaps  three  million  francs  a  year,  a  small 
part  of  which  is  paid  to  the  municipality  to  meet  the 
expenses  of  the  official  service  of  funeral  inspection, 
while  the  rest  is  divided  pro  rata  among  the  con- 
stituent churches  and  parishes.     Whatever  criticisms 
may  be  brought  against  the  system,  there  may  be 

•j    •       •*     *  4.1?  4.    •*   1,         *i.  •*.      f  1      -4.       Meritsofthe 

said  in  its  favor  that  it  has  the  merit  or  regularity      system, 
and  uniformity  in  method  and  in  charges ;    that  it 
helps  to  protect  the  poor  against  extortion ;  and  that 
for  the  community  as  a  whole  it  probably  insures  a 
more  dignified  and  appropriate  conduct  of  obsequies 
at  a  smaller  average  expense  than  could  be  expected 
from  private  entrepreneurs  if  the  monopoly  were  abol- 
ished.   But  with  or  without  this  ecclesiastical  man- 
agement, there  would  continue  to  exist  the  strictest 
municipal  oversight  and  control,  because  for  centuries       strict 
it  has  in  France  been  deemed  a  public  duty  to  regulate     control. 
everything  having  to  do  with  the  disposition  of  the 
dead. 

Under  the  old  regime  at  Paris  the  interference  of 
state  and  of  municipality  in  the  business  of  food-sup- 
ply went  much  further  than  an  ordinary  control  of  Government 
markets,  with  an  inspection  of  meat  and  drink,  of      supply. 
bread,  fruit,  and  all  sorts  of  alimentary  substances 
and  products,  in  behalf  of  the  public  health.     It  com- 
pletely denied  every  principle  of  commercial  liberty, 
proceeding  upon  the  doctrine  that  the  appro  visionne- 
ment  of  a  great  capital  required  governmental  initia- 
tive or  interposition  at  every  point.     The  regulations 


98 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Public  regu- 
lation of 
trades. 


Existing 
agencies  of 
supervision. 


The  public- 
health 
motive. 


The  central 
market. 


that  governed  the  exercise  of  trades  connected  with 
the  food-supply,  and  that  prescribed  prices,  were  so 
enforced  as  to  bring  butchering,  baking,  wine-selling, 
and  other  trades  into  the  position  of  semi-public  mo- 
nopolies. The  spirit  of  all  this  regulative  system  has 
gradually  changed.  The  administration  continues  to 
exercise  large  supervision,  but  commerce  has  been  un- 
shackled, and  the  natural  laws  of  trade  are  relied 
upon  to  secure  for  the  Parisians  a  constant  supply  of 
food  and  drink  at  normal  prices.  The  existing  muni- 
cipal agencies  seem  to  me  to  be  highly  commendable. 
Taken  together,  they  comprise  a  large  property  in- 
vestment, and  a  series  of  elaborate  and  skilled  admin- 
istrative services ;  and  they  form  a  considerable  source 
of  municipal  revenue. 

Whereas  the  ancient  motive  that  governed  public 
policy  was  to  make  sure  of  a  sufficient  and  cheap  food- 
supply,  the  present  motive  is  to  exercise  an  oversight 
for  the  public  health  and  welfare.  This  surveillance 
de  Talimentation  is  made  comparatively  easy  by  the 
municipal  ownership  of  all  markets,  cattle-yards,  and 
slaughter-houses,  together  with  great  entrep6ts,  or 
storage-houses,  chiefly  used  for  wines  and  other 
drinks,  and  by  the  further  fact  of  the  octroi  sys- 
tem, which  makes  possible  a  preliminary  inspection  of 
food-supplies  from  the  health  standpoint  when  at  the 
city  limits  or  in  the  railway  stations  they  are  ex- 
amined by  the  revenue  officers  of  the  municipal 
customs  service. 

The  market  system  of  Paris  is  undergoing  almost 
constant  extensions,  to  the  great  benefit  of  the  people. 
The  Halles  Centrales,  a  huge  covered  market  of 
about  twenty-two  acres  in  the  heart  of  the  city,  is  the 
nucleus  for  the  wholesale  distribution  every  morning 
of  the  food-supplies  that  arrive  in  the  night  from  all 
parts  of  France  and  from  neighboring  countries.  In 


PAKIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


99 


due  time  this  market  will  be  served  by  an  under- 
ground railway  connecting  with  the  belt  lines.  It  has 
retail  as  well  as  wholesale  pavilions,  and  is  probably 
the  greatest  market  in  the  world.  It  stands  where  pub- 
lic markets  have  for  centuries  been  concentrated ;  but 
the  present  buildings  belong  to  the  era  of  the  Hauss- 
maun  aggrandizements.  The  plans  were  adopted 
in  1854,  and  50,000,000  francs  were  spent  in  carrying 
them  out.  The  basements  are  great  storage  ware- 
houses. But  the  municipality  also  maintains  cov- 
ered retail  markets  in  all  parts  of  the  city,  which  are 
in  daily  operation,  besides  a  number  of  open-air 
markets,  with  two  or  three  market-days  every  week. 
The  existence  of  nearly  a  hundred  public  markets, 
great  and  small,  does  not  prevent  a  large  number  of 
magasinSj  or  private  shops  and  stores,  from  dealing 
extensively,  at  wholesale  and  retail,  in  all  kinds  of 
alimentary  supplies;  but  it  is  readily  seen  that  the 
market  system  is  a  most  wholesome  regulator  of 
prices,  and  that  it  benefits  at  the  same  time  the  work- 
ing-people of  the  metropolis  and  the  gardeners  and 
farmers  of  the  vicinity.  From  concessions  in  the 
market  places  the  city  has  an  annual  income  of  more 
than  8,000,000  francs. 

The  concentration  of  the  slaughtering  business  in  a 
series  of  municipal  abattoirs  was  a  policy  adopted  early 
in  the  century,  five  such  establishments  superseding 
the  hundreds  of  private  slaughtering-sheds  in  which 
each  butcher  prepared  his  own  beeves,  sheep,  and 
swine  for  the  shambles.  In  this  enlightened  policy, 
as  in  so  many  others,  Paris  led  where  Europe  and  the 
civilized  world  have  followed.  The  annexation  of  the 
suburbs  in  1860  necessitated  the  suppression  of  pri- 
vate slaughter-houses  in  the  new  arrondissements ; 
and  accordingly  there  was  built  in  the  Villette  quarter, 
at  the  north  of  Paris,  the  immense  abattoir  general,  in 


CHAP.  I. 


The  present 
buildings. 


A  hundred 
other  mar- 
kets. 


Municipal 

income  from 

markets. 


Public 
abattoirs. 


100 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i.  which  since  1870  almost  the  entire  business  of  slaugh- 
tering the  metropolitan  meat-supply  has  been  con- 
centrated. Two  of  the  five  earlier  abattoirs  have  a 
limited  patronage,  but  La  Villette  holds  the  almost 
exclusive  monopoly.  Adjoining  the  huge  abattoir  are 
the  municipal  cattle-yards  and  markets,  with  accom- 
modations for  scores  of  thousands  of  animals.  Lately 
cattie-yards.  there  has  been  added  a  large  establishment  called  the 
Sanatorium,  in  which  animals  subject  for  any  reason 
to  suspicion  of  infectious  disease  (particularly  sheep 
from  eastern  Europe)  are  held  in  quarantine  pending 
examination.  The  cattle  trade  is  admitted  to  the  use 
of  the  stock-yards  on  payment  of  moderate  fees,  while 
all  butchers  in  like  manner  have  access  to  the  abat- 
toirs, subject  to  the  proper  regulations.  This  con- 
centration of  the  meat-supply,  it  need  not  be  said, 
facilitates  prompt  and  complete  scientific  inspection 
by  the  municipal  health  officers  who  are  detailed  to 
that  particular  task.  It  would  not,  of  course,  be  poli- 
tic to  exploit  an  abattoir  monopoly  for  large  public 
revenues.  The  average  income  from  this  source  has 
for  some  years  been  about  3,000,000  francs,  which  is 
amply  remunerative. 

The  service  of  food  inspection,  which  has  its  out-of- 
door  staff  stationed  in  the  Halles,  markets,  and  abat- 
toirs, or  detailed  to  visit  the  bakeries,  milk-shops,  and 
various  places  where  supplies  are  sold,  is  directed 
and  supported  in  its  work  by  a  great  chemical  and 
bacteriological  laboratory,  which  within  a  few  years 
has  grown  into  a  position  of  prime  importance  in  the 
administrative  work  of  Paris.  The  city  had  been 
early  to  employ  the  best  available  engineering,  archi- 
tectural, and  other  technical  talent,  and  its  discovery 
of  the  many  valuable  uses  to  which  a  modern  scien- 
tific laboratory  may  be  put  was  sure  to  come  in  due 
time.  Until  nearly  1880  the  prefecture  of  police  had 


Inspection 
facilitated. 


The  muni- 
cipal labora- 
tory. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  101 

maintained  a  force  of  so-called  dfyustateurs, —  tasters,     CHAP.  i. 
as  we  should  say, —  whose  duty  it  was  to  go  from 
boutique  to  boutique,  from  milk-shop  to  bake-shop,  and     The  oid- 

fashioned 

from  butcher  to  green- grocer,  tasting  and  smelling  "tasters." 
and  prying  in  order  to  find  adulterations  or  un- 
wholesome conditions.  These  tasters  were  the  sub- 
jects of  derision,  violent  abuse,  petty  bribery,  num- 
berless complaints.  The  laboratory  has  substituted 
exact  science  for  unreliable  guessing1.  Thousands  of 

4.    1          u      ^-u      A  Replaced  by 

specimens  every  year  are  taken  by  the  department  or     chemists. 
submitted  by  individuals  for  analysis.     When  the 
milk  examinations  began  in  earnest  in  1881,  it  was 
found  that  more  than  fifty  per  cent,  of  the  specimens 
analyzed  showed  adulteration  —  a  most  appalling  cir- 
cumstance in  view  of  the  relation  that  pure  milk     improye- 
bears  to  child-life  in  a  great  city.     In  1891  the  milk  miik  supply. 
adulterations  had  fallen  to  less  than  ten  per  cent. 
The  value  of  this  improvement  in  the  milk-supply  is 
almost  beyond  computation.     If  the  laboratory  had 
done  nothing  else,  this  would  have  justified  its  crea- 
tion and  cost  a  hundred  times  over.     But  the  bread- 
supply,  so  essential  to  the  Parisian  poor,  who  al-    ^ebake" 
most  live  upon  the  long  loaves  of  the  bake-shops,       sh°P8- 
has  also  been  rendered  very  much  more  wholesome 
by  the  discovery,  thanks  to  the  municipal  chemists, 
of  various  deleterious  substances  and  processes.    As 
for  the  wine  of  common  consumption,  its  adultera- 
tion was  found  to  be  almost  universal  before  1880; 
but  thousands  of  analyses,  followed   by  swift  ap-     of  wines. 
prehension  of  offenders,  have  quite  transformed  the 
character  of  the  supply.    In  a  hundred  ways  not  at 
first  anticipated,  the  municipal  laboratory  has  come 
to  the  service  of  honest  trade  and  to  the  protection 
of  the  consuming  public.    At  a  moderate  price  it  is 
ready  to  make  a  prompt  and  authoritative  analysis 
for  any  private  applicant.    As  a  rule,  the  irnperfec- 


102 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


Favorable 
effect  upon 
death-rate. 


CHAP.  i.     tions  in  food  articles  discovered  since  1890  are  of  a 
far  less  serious  nature  than  those  found  ten  years 
earlier.    Harmful  substances  are  not  often  found  to- 
day in  the  Parisian  confections,  whereas  in  1880  such 
General  ser-    adulterations  were  usual.    The  laboratory  makes  hun- 

vices  of  the  * 

laboratory,  dreds  of  water  analyses  yearly,  gives  scientific  aid  to 
the  practical  service  of  disinfection,  in  several  ways 
contributes  to  the  work  of  improving  the  methods 
of  sewage  disposal  and  treatment,  and,  in  short, 
lends  itself  quite  indispensably  to  one  phase  or  an- 
other of  the  work  of  almost  every  department  of  the 
municipal  administration. 

Some  of  the  most  far-reaching  measures  for  the 
promotion  of  the  public  health  have  not  yet  had 
time  to  accomplish  results  strikingly  apparent  in  the 
statistics  of  the  Parisian  death-rate.  The  completion 
of  the  double  water-supply,  of  the  work  of  cesspool 
extinction,  of  the  sewage-farm  system,  and  of  some 
other  sanitary  reforms,  must,  however,  within  a  few 
years  have  a  clear  effect  upon  the  bills  of  mortality. 

A  very  remarkable  decline  of  typhoid  fever  has 
already  followed  the  measures  of  sanitary  ameliora- 
tion that  have  been  pursued,  so  that  the  deaths  from 
this  cause  in  the  decade  from  1882  to  1892  were  not 
nearly  half  as  many  as  in  the  preceding  decade,  while 
in  the  most  recent  years  the  typhoid  scourge  has 
seemed  to  be  nearing  the  point  of  extinction. 

Public  charity,  centrally  administered  as  one  vast, 
unified  department  under  the  name  of  U  Assistance 
The  work  of   Publique  d  Paris,  has  absorbed  and  systematized  al- 
charity.      most  every  important  form  and  agency  of  relief  and 
succor.     The  charitable  work  of  ecclesiastical  and 
benevolent  societies  and  of  private  individuals,  large 
as  it  must  be  in  the  aggregate,  lies  in  the  back- 
ground without  much  pretense  of  organization  or 


Decline  of 

typhoid 

fever. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  103 

thoroughness,  and  is  carried  on  with  fewer  establish-  CHAP.  i. 
ments  and  institutions  than  one  finds  in  English  or 

American  cities.    To  the  Assistance  Publique,  with  a  ((  scope  of 


large  council  of  administration  and  a  single  executive 
head,  belong  (1)  the  great  hospitals  of  Paris  ;  (2)  the 
homes,  asylums,  and  retreats  for  the  aged  poor,  the 
orphaned  or  friendless  children,  and  special  groups 
of  the  defective  and  dependent  classes;  and  (3)  the 
supervision  and  support  of  outdoor  or  domiciliary 
relief,  whether  in  the  form  of  medical  attendance, 
temporary  succor  with  money,  food,  or  fuel,  or  regu- 
lar and  permanent  aid  at  home  in  lieu  of  support  in 
an  institution.  Overlapping  of  charitable  work  is 
prevented  by  this  unified  administration,  and  there 
results  a  more  prompt  and  more  universal  alleviation 
of  distress  than  could  otherwise  be  secured,  with  a 
minimum  of  extravagance  or  abuse. 

This  huge  consolidation  of  relief  work  is  the  out- 
growth of  several  centuries  of  varied  experience,  and 
it  reached  its  completed  form  in  about  the  year  1850.    consoiida- 
The  laws  of  the  Revolutionary  period  had  transferred  16 


the  administration  of  hospitals  and  public  charity 
from  semi-ecclesiastical  to  purely  civil  and  secular 
auspices.  But  hospitals  and  asylums  remained  for  a 
long  time  under  a  management  quite  distinct  from 
that  of  the  ordinary  distribution  of  alms  or  medical 
succor  to  the  poor  in  their  homes  or  at  local  dispen- 
saries. The  law  of  1849  united  all  these  forms  of 
public  relief  in  one  general  administration,  although 
the  various  services  are  highly  differentiated.  Under 
the  control  and  surveillance  of  the  central  Assistance 
Publique  there  exists  in  every  arrondissement  a  The''1?"" 

^  "  reaux  de  bien- 

Bureau  de  Bienfaisance,  with   headquarters   in   the    faisance." 
mairie  building;  and  in  this  bureau  is  concentrated 
the  practical  work  of  poor  relief  for  the  arrondisse- 
ment concerned.    Attached  to  it  are  the  neighbor- 


104 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


General  or- 
ganization. 


A  great  char- 
ity board. 


Membership 
of  the  body. 


Represent- 
ative sys- 
tem. 


hood  visitors,  who  know  the  people  and  are  known 
by  them,  and  through  whom  the  deserving  poor  are 
likely  to  find  prompt  assistance.  But  I  shall  mention 
more  particularly  the  bureaux  de  bienfaisance  after 
describing  the  organization  of  the  central  Assistance 
Publique. 

The  entire  administration  is  under  the  authority  of 
the  prefect  of  the  Seine  and  his  superior,  the  Minister 
of  the  Interior,  and  is  actively  exercised  by  a  single 
responsible  director,  who  is  nominated  by  the  prefect 
and  appointed  by  the  minister.  But  the  director  is 
guided  in  all  important  matters  by  the  advice  of  a 
council  of  surveillance,  which  is  required  by  law  to 
meet  as  often  as  once  every  fifteen  days,  and  which 
may  be  called  together  as  frequently  as  occasion  re- 
quires. In  the  hands  of  this  great  board  of  public 
charity  rests  the  policy  that  expends  a  yearly  revenue 
of  perhaps  thirty  million  francs.  The  composition 
of  the  board  is  highly  characteristic  of  the  Parisian 
system.  It  has  twenty  members,  including  the  pre- 
fect of  the  Seine  and  the  prefect  of  police  by  virtue 
of  their  offices.  The  prefect  of  the  Seine  is  president 
of  the  board.  Of  the  remaining  eighteen,  thirteen 
are  delegates  from  other  bodies,  and  five  are  directly 
appointed  from  without.  The  thirteen  must  include 
two  members  of  the  municipal  council,  two  naaires  or 
adjoint-maires  of  arrondissements,  two  representa- 
tives of  the  local  bureaux  de  bienfaisance,  one  repre- 
sentative of  the  Council  of  State,  one  of  the  Court  of 
Cassation,  a  hospital  physician,  a  hospital  surgeon,  a 
professor  of  the  faculty  of  medicine,  a  member  of  the 
chamber  of  commerce,  and  a  member  of  one  of  the 
councils  of  prucPhommes.  These  various  bodies  pre- 
sent lists  of  candidates  when  places  are  to  be  filled, 
and  the  selection  is  made  by  the  President  of  the 
Republic  on  recommendation  of  the  Minister  of  the 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  105 

Interior.  The  five  remaining  members  are  directly  CHAP.  i. 
appointed.  Membership  in  all  cases  (except  those  of 
the  two  prefects)  is  for  a  term  of  six  years,  and  one 
third  of  the  eighteen  retire  every  two  years,  with 
indefinite  reeligibility.  The  high  character  of  this 
board  is  thus  assured  by  the  very  nature  of  its  com- 
position. Under  its  enlightened  surveillance  every 
feature  of  the  work  of  public  charity  makes  steady 
progress,  and  every  new  scientific  or  sociological 
development  finds  just  recognition. 

It  does  not  belong  to  my  account  of  organization 
and  of  method  to  give  a  list  of  the  splendid  series  of 
general  and  special  hospitals,  hospices,  asylums,  and 
retreats  that  are  maintained  by  the  Assistance  Pub- 
lique.  But  I  may  verv  properly  remark  upon  the 

,     .  *  c    ,         .          Hospitals 

great  expansion  and  improvement  of  the  series  in  and  asylums 
the  period  since  1872.  All  in  all,  they  contain  ac- 
commodations for  about  thirty  thousand  patients 
and  inmates.  One  of  the  chief  innovations  of  recent 
years  has  been  the  gradual  but  rapid  transformation 
of  the  hospitals  from  a  religious  to  a  secular  basis. 
The  nurses  and  chief  attendants  until  after  1881 
were  supplied  by  various  religious  orders.  The  j^^ 
municipal  authorities  have  preferred  to  substitute  the  service. 
their  own  regularly  trained  professional  nurses  for 
the  members  of  the  religious  sisterhoods.  Several 
training-schools  were  opened  in  connection  with  the 
great  hospitals,  and  one  by  one  the  institutions  have 
been  completely  laicized,  until  the  religieuses  are  left 
only  in  a  few  places  where  their  presence  is  expressly 
required  by  the  terms  of  bequests  and  donations. 

The  medical  and  surgical  services  of  the  hospitals 
and  asvlums  are  of  the  highest  repute,  and  it  greatly  Medical  and 

-  .  A-  -L.  A.    j      surgical  or- 

enhances  a  professional  reputation  to  be  connected 
with  the  hospitals.  Admission  to  these  services  is 
based  upon  competitive  examination,  and  the  physi- 


106 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  i. 


Outside  re- 
lief work. 


"Medical 

secours 

a  domicile." 


cians  and  surgeons  are  content  to  receive  very  small 
pay.  A  great  number  of  special  laboratories  are 
maintained  in  the  hospitals,  and  every  encouragement 
is  given  to  the  professional  staff  to  make  researches 
^at  w^  a(^  to  the  world's  knowledge  of  diseases 
and  their  treatment.  To  this  end,  also,  a  remarkable 
series  of  medical  libraries  is  maintained,  and  a  yearly 
appropriation  is  made  to  subsidize  members  of  the 
staff  who  are  detailed  to  pursue  investigations  in 
other  countries.  The  instruction  given  in  the  schools 
for  nurses  is  especially  complete  and  thorough,  and 
in  a  variety  of  ways  the  hospital  administration  lends 
itself  to  the  advancement  of  professional  skill  and 
knowledge,  and  to  the  progress  of  scientific  surgery, 
medicine,  and  hygiene. 

The  minute  organization  of  the  charity  depart- 
ment makes  it  easy  in  practice  to  ascertain  through 
prompt  inquiries  what  applicants  are  entitled  to  free 
hospital  treatment,  what  applicants  are  able  to  pay, 
what  persons  are  entitled  to  free  medical  aid  in  their 
own  domiciles,  and  so  on.  In  general  it  is  the  ac- 
cepted policy  to  admit  to  institutions  none  who  can 
be  cared  for  outside.  For  nearly  all  the  purposes 
of  this  outside  relief  work,  the  Assistance  Publique 
avails  itself  of  the  cooperation  of  the  several  bureaux 
de  bieufaisance  of  the  arrondissements.  Each  arron- 
dissement  has  its  corps  of  resident  physicians  at- 
tached to  the  service  of  medical  secours  d  domicile. 
It  is  held  to  be  an  honor  and  a  mark  of  professional 
prestige  to  serve  the  community  in  this  capacity,  and 
when  a  four  years'  appointment  is  to  be  made,  the 
practising  physicians  of  the  arrondissement  are  all 
called  together  to  elect  a  candidate  by  ballot.  It  is 
enough  to  remark  of  this  system  that  it  tends  to 
secure  for  the  poor  in  their  homes  an  attentive  and 
skilful  ministry  of  medical  relief.  Midwives,  in  like 
manner,  appertain  to  each  bureau  de  bienfaisance. 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


107 


The  maire,  it  has  been  explained,  sits  as  chairman 
of  the  arrondissement  charity  board,  or  bureau  de 
bienfaisance,  which  has  its  offices  in  the  raairie  build- 
ing, accessible  to  the  whole  neighborhood.  Besides 
the  maire  the  bureau  is  composed  of  twelve  adminis- 
trateurs,  half  of  whom  are  appointed  by  the  prefect 
and  half  by  the  municipal  council,  and  who  are  re- 
eligible  on  expiration  of  their  two-year  terms.  These 
official  members  of  the  bureau  associate  with  them- 
selves an  indefinite  number  of  well-disposed  men  and 
women  willing  to  aid  in  household  visitation  of  the 
poor ;  and  these  are  known  as  commissaires  de  charite" 
and  dames  de  charite.  For  purposes  of  poor  relief  the 
arrondissement  is  divided  into  twelve  sections,  each 
one  of  which  is  assigned  to  an  administrateur,  who 
in  turn  may  command  the  aid  of  several  of  the  dames 
or  commissaires  de  charite.  Still  further,  in  each 
arrondissement  there  are  several  so-called  maisons  de 
secours  (houses  of  relief),  which  are  headquarters  of 
sisters  of  charity  who  minister  to  the  sick  and  carry- 
on  at  still  closer  quarters  much  of  the  practical  work 
of  the  bureau  de  bienfaisance.  I  have  endeavored  to 
make  it  clear  that  the  whole  structure  of  the  twenty 
Parisian  bureaux  de  bienfaisance  is  so  designed  as  to 
render  it  reasonably  certain  that  in  the  actual  relief 
of  the  poor  the  unpaid  services  of  trustworthy  neigh- 
bors may  be  secured,  rather  than  those  of  perfunctory 
officials.  It  is  also  intended  that  the  small  districts 
may  insure  complete  supervision  and  intimate  know- 
ledge of  conditions. 

In  recent  years  no  part  of  the  work  of  assistance 
publique  has  been  more  carefully  developed  than  that 
which  relates  to  the  rescue,  maintenance,  and  proper 
instruction  of  friendless  children.  It  is  possible  that 
the  low  birth-rate  in  France  has  had  something  to  do 
with  the  awakening  of  a  special- solicitude  for  every 
child  of  French  parentage — a  feeling  that  has  be- 


CHAP.  I. 


The  "bien- 
faisance " 
system. 


Volunteer 
members. 


Neighborly 
ministra- 
tions in 
small  dis- 
tricts. 


Care  of 
friendless 
children. 


108 

CHAP.  1. 


The  city's 
wards  in 
country 
homes. 


Sources  of 

charitable 

income. 


Tax  on 
theater 
tickets. 


Municipal 
appropria- 
tions. 


Emergency 
services. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

come  embodied  in  public  policy.  In  the  case  of  every 
unfortunate  child,  the  State,  as  represented  by  the 
Assistance  Publique  a  Paris,  aims  to  be  very  much 
more  than  a  grudging  stepfather.  Its  efforts  are 
destined  to  produce  some  interesting  results  in  the 
field  of  the  physical  and  mental  training  of  children. 
Besides  thousands  placed  in  industrial  schools  and 
otherwise  provided  for,  many  thousands  more  are 
every  year  sent  to  country  homes,  where  the  au- 
thorities maintain  a  general  surveillance  over  them. 
Thus,  in  any  given  year  the  Paris  officials  in  charge 
of  enfants  assistes  have  on  their  active  lists  some 
thirty  thousand  children  distributed  as  apprentices 
to  farmers. 

The  Assistance  Publique  a  Paris  has  through  lega- 
cies and  gifts  acquired  a  considerable  endowment, 
and  its  income  from  invested  funds  is  several  million 
francs.  It  is  also  the  recipient  almost  every  day 
of  new  bequests  or  donations  available  for  some  part 
of  its  current  expenditure.  Many  of  the  particular 
bureaux  de  bienfaisance  also  have  endowment  funds 
of  their  own.  Moreover,  there  are  certain  special 
sources  of  revenue  set  apart  for  the  charity  adminis- 
tration, one  of  them  being  a  tax  of  ten  per  cent,  on 
the  cost  of  all  theater  tickets  and  on  the  gross  rev- 
enue of  all  places  of  amusement.  This  particular 
source  yields  a  yearly  charitable  income  of  from 
three  to  four  million  francs.  The  municipal  council 
votes  annual  appropriations,  averaging  about  twenty 
million  francs,  to  make  the  revenues  of  the  Bureau  of 
Assistance  Publique  equal  to  its  necessities. 

In  a  remarkable  variety  of  ways  the  Parisian  mu- 
nicipality has  in  very  recent  years  attempted  to  play 
the  r61e  of  prompt  friend  and  servitor  to  its  people 
in  times  of  emergency  and  special  misfortune.  The 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


109 


stations  along  the  river  and  canals,  and  elsewhere  in 
the  central  districts,  for  life-saving  services  and  in- 
stant succor  in  cases  of  drowning  or  street  accidents, 
form  a  well-known  instance.  Much  less  known,  but 
far  more  important,  is  the  service  of  night  medical 
and  surgical  relief,  organized  in  every  neighborhood 
of  the  metropolis,  and  responding  each  year  to  a 
rapidly  increasing  demand. 

Municipal  lodging-houses  have  in  the  past  been  no 
part  of  the  Parisian  policy ;  but  an  experimental  be- 
ginning was  made  in  1886,  and  there  are  now  three 
institutions  in  service,  two  for  men  and  one  for 
women,  with  the  prospect  of  a  further  development 
of  the  system.  These  Parisian  lodging-houses  (refuges 
de  nuit)  are  absolutely  free  of  all  charge  to  their 
guests,  French  policy  in  this  regard  being  entirely 
different  from  that  of  the  British  cities.  Care  is 
taken  not  to  admit  vagabonds  or  unworthy  charac- 
ters, the  intention  being  to  afford  shelter  to  hon- 
est laborers  who  are  seeking  work.  Such  men  are 
permitted  to  come  for  three  successive  nights.  None 
are  admitted  who  have  not  been  residents  of  Paris 
for  some  time.  The  two  establishments  have  a  capa- 
city of  perhaps  six  hundred  per  night.  Their  facili- 
ties for  laundry  work  and  disinfection  are  complete, 
and  each  guest  is  provided  with  a  change  of  clothing 
while  present.  Soup  is  served  at  night,  and  bread  is 
given  to  every  one  in  the  morning.  All  possible  as- 
sistance is  lent  in  the  quest  for  employment.  Thus, 
in  the  course  of  every  year  the  city  dispenses  hospi- 
tality to  thousands  of  honest  men  in  temporary  need. 

The  lodging-house  for  working-women  is  of  a  dif- 
ferent character,  inasmuch  as  it  allows  necessitous 
women  to  bring  children  with  them,  and  affords  them 
shelter  and  care  as  long  as  the  exigency  requires, 
the  average  sojourn  being  nearly  a  month.  Until 


CHAP.  I. 


Night  medi- 
cal relief. 


Municipal 
lodging- 
houses. 


A  generous 
hospitality. 


A  transient 
home  for 
working- 
women. 


110 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Subventions 
to  creches. 


Advance  of 
rent-money. 


An  agricul- 
tural colony. 


The  policy 
to  be  ex- 
tended. 


they  can  obtain  employment  elsewhere  they  are  given 
something  to  do  in  the  lodging-house.  Those  who 
enter  this  place  are,  in  good  faith,  women  who  are  ac- 
customed to  earn  their  own  living  by  honest  labor. 

By  subventions  from  the  municipal  treasury  the 
city  council  aids  in  the  maintenance  of  the  numer- 
ous creches  which  render  free  service  to  so  many 
working-women  of  Paris.  Another  interesting  form 
of  aid  which  the  city  council  promotes  very  liberally 
is  the  advance  of  rent-money  in  cases  where  worthy 
families,  through  illness  or  other  misfortune,  have 
been  evicted  by  their  landlords,  and  have  no  means 
with  which  to  engage  a  new  domicile.  This,  ob- 
viously, is  a  kind  of  charity  that  calls  for  great  dis- 
cretion. But  through  the  minute  and  thorough 
organization  of  the  bureaux  de  bienfaisance  it  is 
quite  possible  to  render  such  aid,  as  a  temporary 
loan  in  deserving  instances,  and  to  withhold  it  where 
its  application  would  be  unwise.  From  fifteen  to 
twenty  thousand  families  each  year  are  helped  in 
this  way. 

In  1891  the  municipality  began  the  experiment  of 
an  agricultural  colony  on  a  farm  that  it  had  acquired 
at  Chalmelle,  in  the  department  of  Marne.  It  had 
found  among  Paris  paupers  a  considerable  element 
of  men  who  had  come  to  the  city  from  the  rural 
districts,  and  had  gone  completely  to  the  wall.  The 
agricultural  colony  is  proving  to  be  the  best  place 
for  such  men,  and  the  experiment  is  to  be  extended 
so  as  to  embrace  families  (single  men  only  have  here- 
tofore been  admitted),  and  separate  cottages  with 
gardens  are  to  be  allotted  to  such  families.  It  is 
expected  that  the  farm  colony  will  serve  as  the  door- 
way through  which  many  men  that  have  failed  in 
the  city  can  be  successfully  reabsorbed  into  the  agri- 
cultural life  of  France,  or  else  equipped  for  a  new 
start  in  one  of  the  French  dependencies. 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


111 


Free  bureaus  of  employment  are  now  maintained 
in  the  mairies  of  most  of  the  arrondissements  of 
Paris,  and  the  municipal  council  votes  a  subven- 
tion each  year  toward  their  support.  Private  citi- 
zens who  have  the  time  and  means,  and  who  are 
generously  disposed  toward  the  workingmen  of 
their  neighborhoods,  give  much  voluntary,  unpaid 
service  to  the  management  of  these  local  labor  ex- 
changes. The  results  are  beneficent  in  various 
ways.  As  a  crowning  evidence  of  its  devotion  to 
the  cause  of  labor,  the  Paris  municipal  council 
determined,  in  1886,  to  establish  a  great  Bourse  du 
Travail,  or  central  labor  exchange.  This  institution 
was  completed  and  opened  in  1892,  about  two  mil- 
lion francs  having  been  expended  upon  it.  It  became 
at  once  the  headquarters  of  all  the  trades-unions  and 
labor  bodies  in  Paris,  not  less  than  eighty -two  trades 
being  represented  through  the  appointed  agents  of 
their  societies.  The  municipal  council  votes  fifty 
thousand  francs  a  year  toward  the  maintenance  of 
the  institution,  and  it  is  believed  that  the  Bourse  will 
prove  in  many  ways  promotive  of  the  well-being  of 
Parisian  artisans,  and  of  the  industrial  and  commer- 
cial progress  of  the  metropolis. 

Such  an  official  recognition  by  the  municipal  gov- 
ernment of  the  organized  workingmen's  bodies,  it 
should  be  remembered,  grows  out  of  a  French  policy 
the  roots  of  which  sink  deep  into  the  practices  of  the 
middle  ages.  Under  the  old  regime  all  matters  affect- 
ing wages  and  industry  were  settled  by  the  tribunals 
of  the  trades  guilds  and  merchant  bodies.  These  cor- 
porations disappeared  in  the  vortex  of  the  great 
Revolution ;  but,  as  to  some  of  their  attributes  and 
functions,  they  were  virtually  reestablished  in  the 
early  days  of  the  present  century  in  the  form  of  tri- 
bunals of  commerce  and  covtseils  des  prud'hommes. 
In  all  large  towns  the  municipal  government  became 


CHAP.  I. 


Free  em- 
ployment 
offices  in  the 
mairies. 


The  central 
labor  ex- 
change. 


Municipal 
subvention. 


Government 
and  labor 
unions. 


112 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Councils 
of  "  prud'- 
hommes." 


Organization 
at  Paris. 


Trades 
unions  may 
bid  for  pub- 
lic work. 


The  public 
pawnshop. 


responsible  for  the  support  of  these  special  tribunals 
for  the  prompt  adjustment  of  differences  arising  in 
the  course  of  trade  and  industry.  In  the  conseils 
des  prud'hommes  the  employers  and  the  workingmen 
are  allowed  exactly  equal  representation.  The  sys- 
tem inevitably  encourages  the  organization  of  distinct 
trades  and  crafts  in  unions.  The  prud'hommes  in 
Paris  are  in  four  distinct  councils,  one  of  which  be- 
longs to  the  building  trades,  one  to  textile  industries, 
one  to  chemical  and  kindred  manufactures,  and  one 
to  metal  industries  and  miscellaneous  crafts.  From 
twenty-five  thousand  to  thirty  thousand  cases  are 
brought  before  these  Paris  prud'hommes  every  year, 
—  most  of  the  cases  relating  to  differences  about 
wages, —  and  the  great  majority  are  promptly  ad- 
justed by  conciliation  without  appreciable  cost.  It 
would  seem  likely  that  the  erection  of  the  new  labor 
bourse  would  tend  to  the  strengthening  of  such  com- 
mendable agencies  as  the  conseils  des  prud'hommes, 
and  that  it  would  also  contribute  toward  the  solu- 
tion of  the  problem  how  to  prevent  strikes. 

It  is  worth  while  to  mention  the  fact  that  the  mu- 
nicipal council  several  years  ago  voted  to  allow  asso- 
ciations of  workingmen  to  make  bids  for  public  work 
let  by  contract,  thus  in  a  still  different  way  recogniz- 
ing the  labor  organizations,  while  offering  encourage- 
ment to  cooperative  efforts. 

No  department  of  local  administration  has  entered 
more  thoroughly  into  the  customs  and  the  life  of  the 
common  people  of  Paris  than  the  Mont-de-Pttti,  or 
public  pawnshop.  It  is  a  venerable  institution,  for 
it  was  first  established  in  1777.  But  it  has  so  adapted 
its  methods  to  changing  conditions  that  no  one  would 
think  of  considering  it  obsolescent  or  antiquated. 
On  the  contrary,  it  was  never  so  strong  or  so  vital  as 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


113 


in  these  last  years  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The 
services  that  it  renders  the  great  Parisian  commu- 
nity are  exceedingly  creditable  to  the  humane  instincts 
and  sound  business  sense  that  have  made  modern 
French  administration  superior  in  its  conservation 
of  the  popular  wealth. 

The  mont-de-pie'te  was  established  to  protect  the 
people  from  the  usurers.  Private  pawnbroking  was 
obviously  a  public  evil,  an  aggravation  of  poverty, 
and  too  often  an  ally  of  all  sorts  of  crimes  against 
property.  At  the  outset  the  new  venture  was  placed 
under  the  auspices  and  control  of  the  hospital  and 
charity  administration.  It  was  signally  useful  dur- 
ing the  period  of  economic  disturbance  that  attended 
and  followed  the  great  Revolution.  Its  plan  from 
the  first  has  been  to  receive  interest-bearing  time  de- 
posits, somewhat  like  a  savings-bank,  and  to  use  the 
money  thus  obtained  in  loaning  upon  chattels.  Its 
object  has  not  been  to  earn  net  revenues,  although  it 
has  always  allowed  a  safe  margin  of  profit,  and  has 
thus  accumulated  ample  reserve  funds,  besides  pro- 
viding itself  with  suitable  buildings  and  appliances. 

Besides  a  great  central  establishment  and  three 
large  auxiliaries,  the  mont-de-piete  possesses  twenty 
branches,  in  different  parts  of  Paris,  for  the  conve- 
nience of  the  people  of  the  various  quarters.  The 
number  of  articles  upon  which  loans  were  made  for 
the  year  1892  was  2,276,149,  and  the  amount  loaned 
was  60,765,917  francs.  Thus  the  public  pawnshop, 
upon  the  average,  makes  a  loan  each  year  of  about 
25  francs  to  every  man,  woman,  and  child  of  Paris. 
Formerly  the  loans  were  made  at  the  rate  of  9  per 
cent,  per  annum,  with  a  small  added  charge  of  ap- 
praisal, etc.,  and  4J  per  cent,  was  paid  upon  yearly 
deposits.  But  beginning  with  1885  there  have  been 
gradual  reductions  until  borrowers  have  now  to  pay 


CHAP.  I. 


Objects  of 
the  mont-de- 
piete. 


General 
method. 


Branches, 
and  volume 
of  business. 


Rates  for 
loans  and 
deposits. 


114 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Benefits  to 
small  bor- 
rowers. 


Profits  only 

on  large 

loans. 


Removal  of 
maximum. 


only  at  the  rate  of  6  per  cent.,  with  a  fixed  charge 
of  1  per  cent,  to  cover  insurance  upon  the  articles 
pledged  and  certain  other  expenses.  The  mont-de- 
piete  is  able  to  secure  all  the  money  it  requires  at  3J 
per  cent,  upon  yearly  deposits,  and  2£  or  even  2  per 
cent,  upon  deposits  for  shorter  periods. 

A  great  advantage  to  the  poor  that  arises  from 
the  public  monopoly  of  pawnbroking  is  the  low  rate 
upon  small  loans.  Obviously,  at  the  6  per  cent, 
yearly  rate  all  very  small  loans  (and  the  mont-de- 
piete  lends  as  small  a  sum  as  3  francs)  are  made  at  a 
loss  to  the  institution.  That  is  to  say,  if  it  were  not 
for  the  profit  upon  the  half -million  largest  loans,  it 
would  be  impossible  to  make  the  remaining  two  mil- 
lion loans  at  the  existing  rate.  Loans  smaller  than 
22  francs  are  made  at  a  loss,  even  though  they  are 
outstanding  for  years.  Loans  of  85  francs  are  profit- 
able, even  if  they  are  made  for  only  one  month. 
Some  profit  is  made  on  all  loans  of  a  larger  amount, 
no  matter  how  short  the  time.  But  since  the  average 
of  all  loans  is  from  25  to  30  francs  (the  average  vary- 
ing year  by  year),  it  is  evident  that  the  great  majority 
are  made  at  a  loss,  and  that  the  mont-de-piete  is  thus 
a  boon  to  the  poor. 

Formerly  there  was  a  limit  fixed  upon  the  amount 
that  could  be  borrowed  by  any  one  person ;  but  this 
limit  has  now  been  removed,  experience  having  shown 
that  the  institution  is  financially  strong  enough  to 
meet  all  possible  demands,  and  that  the  increase  of 
large  loans  makes  it  the  easier  to  give  advantageous 
terms  to  the  small  borrowers.  This  removal  of  the 
maximum  has  greatly  increased  the  usefulness  of  the 
institution  to  merchants  and  business  men. 

In  1892  an  innovation  was  adopted  which  has  al- 
ready been  attended  with  the  most  satisfactory  results. 
This  was  the  loaning  of  sums  not  to  exceed  500  francs 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  115 

upon  stocks  and  bonds.   To  appreciate  the  significance     CHAP.  i. 
of  this  step  it  should  be  remembered  that  public  loans 
in  France  are  issued  in  bonds  of  small  denomination,     Loans  on 
which  form  the  favorite  investment  for  the  savings      shares. 
of  employees,  artisans,  small  shopkeepers,  and  thrifty 
servants.    Many  people  of  this  class,  for  example,  own 
one  Paris  municipal  bond  or  Credit  Foncier  bond  of 
400  or  500  francs.     The  Bank  of  France  had  always 
adhered  to  the  rule  of  making  no  loans  smaller  than    Usefulness 
500  francs.     Private  money-lenders  could  not  always      vatum. 
be  relied  upon  to  deal  equitably  with  the  borrower  of 
small  sums  on  shares  of  stock.    The  mont-de-pietS 
now  grants  loans  on  this  class  of  securities  at  6  per 
cent,  to  a  grateful  constituency. 

As  an  illustration  of  the  service  rendered  by  this 
new  department  of  the  mont-de-piete,  let  us  suppose 
that  Jacques  owns  one  share,  or  titre,  of  Paris  muni- 
cipal stock,  and  that  he  has  further  accumulated  300  HOW  it 

7  works  in 

francs  in  the  municipal  savings-bank  at  a  time  when  practice. 
a  desirable  new  loan  is  issued  by  the  municipality,  in 
which  Jacques  has  a  laudable  ambition  to  invest.  Such 
is  his  aversion  to  the  high  rates  and  devious  ways  of 
private  money-lenders  that  he  would  not  have  ventured 
to  hypothecate  his  precious  titre  in  order  to  obtain  100 
francs.  But  he  has  perfect  confidence,  as  every  Pari- 
sian has,  in  the  mont-de-piete.  He  deposits  his  titre, 
borrows  his  100  francs,  withdraws  the  300  from  the 
savings-bank,  goes  to  the  mairie  of  his  arrondissement, 
and  secures  his  new  400-franc  city  bond.  As  soon  as 
he  has  saved  100  francs  he  redeems  the  pledged  titre ; 
and  the  accommodation  has  cost  him  only  half  a  franc 
per  month.  Obviously,  this  arrangement  is  promotive 
of  private  thrift  on  the  one  hand,  and  stimulative  on 
the  other  hand  of  the  popular  market  for  municipal 
bonds  and  various  public  or  quasi-public  securities. 
This  public  monopoly  of  pawnshops,  far  from  abet- 


116  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  i.     ting  theft,  has  proved  a  chief  agency  in  helping  the 

police  authorities  to  detect  and  prevent  stealing.    It 

infrequency   js  said  that  about  360,000  watches  are  received  as 

of  stolen 


pledges  every  year  by  the  Paris  mont-de-piete,  and 
that  only  about  250,  or  7  in  every  10,000,  prove  to 
have  been  stolen.  This  is  an  amazing  record  j  yet  it 
is  further  true  that  the  mont-de-piete  receives  three 
times  as  many  stolen  watches  as  all  other  stolen  ar- 
ticles put  together.  These  figures  express  the  results 
of  a  system  of  vigilant  and  painstaking  cooperation 
between  the  mont-de-piete  and  the  police  authorities 
that  would  require  pages  for  any  detailed  description. 
The  mont-de-piete  is  under  the  responsible  manage- 
ment of  a  single  director,  with  an  elaborate  organiza- 
tion of  subordinates.  Its  affairs  have  the  surveillance 

Make-up  of 

themont-de-  of  a  council  of  administration  of  which  the  prefect  of 
cu.  the  Seine  is  ex-officio  president,  the  prefect  of  police 
being  also  a  member.  Besides  the  two  prefects,  there 
are  nine  others,  of  whom  three  must  be  members  of 
the  municipal  council,  three  must  be  connected  with 
the  Assistance  Publique  or  the  bureaux  de  bienfaisance, 
and  the  remaining  three  must  be  citizens  of  Paris,  and 
may  or  may  not  be  holding  other  official  positions. 
The  appointments  are  for  six  years,  three  members 
retiring  biennially.  Vacancies  are  filled  by  the  Min- 
ister of  the  Interior,  who  designates  his  choice  from 
a  list  of  three  names  presented  by  the  prefect.  The  ac- 
tive director  is  selected  in  the  same  way.  The  council, 
as  constituted  in  practice,  is  thoroughly  representative 
of  the  official  municipal  life  of  Paris,  and  the  mont-de- 
piete  is  thus  kept  in  close  and  harmonious  relation- 
ship with  the  central  authorities  of  the  Hotel  de  Ville 
and  with  the  neighborhood  administration  of  the  ar- 
rondissements  and  the  mairies. 

A  good  system  of  savings-banks  is  much  more  than 
a  convenience  to  the  prudent  and  economical  of  a 


PARIS:   THE   TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  117 

community.      It  is  a  powerful  promoter  of  thrift,     CHAP.I. 
and  a  constant  enemy  of  extravagance  and  improvi- 
dence.   The  multiplication  of  savings-banks  through-  The  savings- 
out  France — municipal  and  private  systems  as  well  as      France. 
the  branches  of  the  national  postal  system  —  is  a  fac- 
tor of  prime  importance  in  the  conservation  of  the  na- 
tional wealth.    Paris  is  elaborately  served  by  a  series 
of  branches  belonging  to  this  national  system  (Caisse 
d'fipargne  Nationale);  but  it  has  also  a  distinct  muni- 
cipal system  of  earlier  date  and  of  still  greater  local     TWO  sys- 
irnportanee.    The  Caisse  d'fipargne  et  de  Prevoyance       fans, 
de  Paris,  as  the  local  system  is  called,  is  managed  by 
an  appointed  board  of  directors  who  serve  without  pay 
of  any  kind,  and  who  are  chosen  from  among  the  most 
distinguished  financiers  of  Paris.     Besides  its  great 
central  establishment  in  the  Rue  Coq-Heron,  it  has 
branches  in  the  mairies  of  the  different  arrondisse-    ™   „  . 

1  lip  l^alSSG 

ments  and  in  the  suburban  communes.    It  has,  in  all     d'E.?arsi*e 

?    and  its  forty 

forty  places  of  business,  for  the  convenience  of  the  branches. 
people  of  the  greater  Paris.  The  number  of  individual 
accounts  increases  every  year.  There  were  582,000 
at  the  beginningof  1890,  and  this  number  had  increased 
to  nearly  630,000  at  the  opening  of  1893.  Thus  one  per- 
son in  every  four  of  the  population  keeps  an  account 
in  the  Caisse  d'fipargne.  The  total  amount  deposited 
was  nearly  160,000,000  francs  on  January  1, 1893,  and 
the  average  credit  was  250  francs.  Nearly  half,  how- 
ever, of  the  depositors  had  accounts  of  less  than  25 
francs. 

These  statistics  do  not  include  the  business  of  the 
Paris  offices  of  the   national   savings-bank  system.     National 
This  branch  of  the  postal  administration  is  compara-    h^ba^ks 
tively  young.    In  1882  its  total  deposits  at  Paris  were 
only  seven  million  francs,  while  in  1892  they  were, 
in  round  figures,   sixty-eight   million   six   hundred 
thousand  francs.    The  average  credit  of  each  deposi- 

8* 


118 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  I. 


A  million 

Parisian 

depositors. 


School 
branches  of 
the  munici- 
pal savings- 
bank. 


tor  in  this  national  postal  system,  which  uses  the 
branch  post-offices  of  Paris  as  depositories,  is  much 
smaller  than  in  the  municipal  system,  but  the  actual 
number  of  patrons  is  about  as  large.  Thus  it  would 
appear  to  be  a  very  conservative  reckoning  to  place 
the  number  of  individual  Parisians  who  have  savings- 
bank  credits,  under  one  system  or  the  other,  at  more 
than  a  million.  The  funds  are  invested  for  the  most 
part  in  public  securities;  and  the  interest  paid  to 
depositors,  which  was  formerly  at  a  higher  rate,  is 
now  generally  at  three,  three  and  one  fourth,  or  three 
and  one  half  per  cent. 

As  long  ago  as  1875  the  savings-bank  feature  was 
introduced  into  the  elementary  schools  of  Paris;  and 
since  that  time  about  two  hundred  and  twenty-five 
different  schools  have,  through  their  teachers,  taught 
practical  thrift  by  means  of  pupils'  branches  (fipargne 
Scolaire)  of  the  Caisse  d'fipargne  de  Paris.  The 
sums  that  poor  children  at  school  can  deposit  in 
savings-banks  are  almost  infinitesimal,  and  the  sys- 
tem is  carried  on  for  the  educational  value  it  seems 
to  possess.  Nevertheless,  the  fipargne  Scolaire  now 
collects  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  francs 
a  year;  and  from  1875  to  1893  it  had  paid  over  to 
the  main  institution  about  two  million  francs  of 
children's  deposits. 

Though  it  is  only  a  minor  incident  in  the  work  of 
the  Parisian  school  system,  the  Epargne  Scolaire  is 
Education    significant  as  pointing  to  the  exceedingly  practical 
mos^teskof  relation  elementary  instruction  is  made  to  bear  in 
Paris  toward  the  part  that  the  citizen  must  play  in 
life.     Indeed,  if  I  were  asked  what,  upon  the  whole, 
I  considered  the  largest,  most  modern,  and  most  es- 
sentially characteristic  of    all   the    departments   or 
undertakings  of  the  Parisian  municipal  authorities, 


the  Paris 
municipal- 
ity. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


119 


schools. 


I  should  be  inclined  to  ascribe  first  place  to  the  work  CHAP.  i. 
of  public  instruction.  The  new  policy  began  with 
the  present  republic,  at  the  end  of  the  Franco-Prus- 
sian war.  In  1873  five  or  six  per  cent,  of  the  young 
Parisians  examined  for  military  duty  were  absolutely 
illiterate.  In  1893  the  illiterates  had  fallen  below 
one  per  cent.  Elementary  instruction  before  1870 
was,  for  the  most  part,  under  ecclesiastical  auspices, 
and  it  was  ill  supported  and  wholly  inadequate.  The 
religious  orders  still  maintain  their  separate  educa- 
tional work,  and  there  are  also  many  private  schools  ; 
but  the  regular  system  of  secular  municipal  public 
schools  has  vastly  outgrown  all  rivals.  Education, 
between  the  ages  of  six  and  fourteen,  has  been  abso- 
lutely compulsory  in  France  since  1881,  and  also  per- 
fectly free.  Not  only  is  instruction  given  without 
charge,  but  books  and  all  other  materials  are  freely 
supplied. 

For  the  smallest  children  there  exists  a  system  of 
so-called  maternal  schools  (ecoles  maternelles),  which  nai  schools. 
are,  in  effect,  kindergartens.  Attendance  is  not  com- 
pulsory, but  it  is  free;  and  these  schools  are  so  de- 
lightfully conducted  that  they  are  an  inexpressible 
boon  to  the  families  of  the  poor.  There  are  about 
two  hundred  of  these  free  maternal  schools  in  Paris, 
with  from  fifty  to  sixty  thousand  little  pupils  under 
six  years  of  age.  To  bridge  the  somewhat  abrupt 
transition  from  the  tender  and  indulgent  methods 
of  the  mistresses  of  the  e"coles  maternelles  to  the 
more  formal  and  rigid  system  that  prevails  in  the  enLntne°s."S 
regular  primary  schools,  it  has  been  found  well  to 
establish  a  system  of  so-called  enfantile  schools  for 
children  between  six  and  eight.  These  are  only  for 
the  more  timid,  sensitive,  or  backward.  They  serve 
an  admirable  purpose  for  thousands  of  children 
every  year. 


120  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  Of  course  the  main  feature  of  the  school  system  is 
the  series  of  primary  schools.  For  the  year  1892 

The  regular  there  were  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty-six  thou- 
schoois.  sand  children  in  these  primary  schools,  of  whom 
eighty-five  thousand  were  boys  and  seventy-one  thou- 
sand were  girls.  The  number  of  schools  was  approxi- 
mately four  hundred,  of  which  half  were  for  boys  and 
half  for  girls ;  and  besides  some  four  hundred  prin- 
cipals, almost  equally  divided  between  men  and 
women,  there  were  more  than  two  thousand  six 
hundred  teachers,  of  whom  half  were  men  and  half 
women. 

In  private  schools,  clerical  and  otherwise,  there  were 
91,500  children.  Thus,  including  the  ecoles  inaternelles 
and  the  public  and  private  primary  schools,  there  were 

attendance,  nearly  310,000  children  enrolled  in  the  Paris  schools 
in  1892, —  not  counting  those  in  the  secondary,  special, 
and  higher  institutions.  More  than  61,000  of  the 
scholars  attending  private  schools  were  girls.  The 
gain  of  the  public  schools  has  been  constant,  and  the 
parochial  institutions,  conducted  by  the  religious  or- 
ders, seem  destined  to  decline  from  year  to  year. 

The  strictly  educational  aspects  of  the  work  and 
methods  of  the  Paris  schools  are  certainly  worth  at- 
tention, but  their  detail  does  not  belong  to  my  present 
theme.  Since,  however,  these  schools  are  the  prime 
solicitude  of  the  municipal  council,  and  deemed  by  all 
the  local  authorities  as  at  the  very  heart  of  the  work 
of  the  municipal  government,  I  may  properly  note 
some  of  their  special  features.  And  first  it  may  be 
explained  that  the  schools  of  each  of  the  twenty  ar- 

organization  rondissements  fall  under  the  general  care  of  an  ar- 

of  school  _ .  .  i  •   i     ,  i       -I         i  • 

system,  rondissement  commission,  over  which  the  local  maire 
presides,  the  other  members  being  appointed  by  the 
municipal  council,  excepting  that  the  Academic  has  a 
representative.  The  whole  system  is  held  together 


PAEIS:   THE   TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


121 


and  assimilated  under  a  scheme  of  governmental  in- 
spection and  management.  It  is  enough  to  say  that 
the  municipal  council,  the  prefectoral  administration, 
and  the  national  ministry  of  education  provide  all  the 
necessary  oversight ;  while  in  the  arroudissements  and 
the  school  districts  themselves  there  are  local  organiza- 
tions that  bring  the  citizens  and  the  parents  into  close 
and  active  relations  with  the  public  schools.  Under 
these  circumstances  it  has  been  easy  to  carry  out  a 
series  of  very  interesting  innovations. 

One  of  these  new  things  is  an  elaborate  service  of 
medical  inspection.  Perhaps  one  hundred  and  fifty 
physicians  are  connected  with  this  service,  and  they 
visit  all  schools  regularly  and  frequently  to  report  upon 
general  sanitary  conditions,  to  watch  for  cases  of  con- 
tagious disease,  and  to  care  for  any  children  needing 
medical  attention.  Medical  school  dispensaries  have 
now  also  been  recently  established  in  most  of  the  ar- 
rondissements,  as  an  extension  of  the  earlier  service 
of  attendance  and  inspection,  and  school  baths  have 
in  a  number  of  instances  been  opened. 

A  particularly  attractive  and  humane  experiment, 
begun  in  1889,  has  proved  itself  a  bright  success. 
This  is  the  system  of  garderies,  or  classes  de  garde,  for 
small  children  whose  parents  are  employed  away  from 
home  during  the  day.  In  many  cases  —  the  instances 
were  numbered  by  the  thousand  —  young  pupils  were 
released  at  four,  while  their  parents  could  not  return 
from  their  work  for  two  hours  or  more.  Such  chil- 
dren are  now  kept  in  custody  by  some  one  connected 
with  their  school,  are  allowed  to  play  under  safe  con- 
ditions, and  are  sent  home  at  the  proper  hour.  In 
some  arrondissements  the  garderies  assume  charge  of 
such  children  in  the  morning  as  well  as  at  night ;  and 
they  are  always  responsible  for  the  safe-keeping  and 
the  happiness  of  their  infant  clientele  on  each  Thurs- 


CHAP.  I. 


Various  in- 
novations. 


Medical  in- 
spection of 
schools. 


Dispensaries 
and  baths. 


The  "  gar- 
deries "  ex- 
periment. 


122 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


at  school. 


CHAP.  i.  day  holiday.  In  1891  there  were  72  of  these  garderies, 
with  4318  children  under  their  care  5  and  the  num- 
bers have  much  increased  since  that  time. 

A  far  more  expensive  experiment,  though  not  less 
firmly  established  as  the  result  of  experience,  is  that 
of  providing  a  warm  noon  meal  at  school  for  the 

Warm  meals  * 

benefit  of  poor  children  who  would  otherwise  have 
little  or  nothing  to  eat  during  the  school  day.  Many 
children  go  to  their  homes  for  the  noon  meal,  but 
the  majority  remain  at  school.  The  cantines  scolaires 
provide  warm  meals  gratuitously  to  those  whose  pa- 
rents are  not  able  to  pay,  and  charge  others  at  the  rate 
of  ten  centimes  (two  American  cents,  or  one  English 
penny)  for  each  meal.  A  uniform  ticket  system  is 
used  in  such  a  way  that  the  children  themselves  can- 
not recognize  any  distinction  between  those  who  are 
fed  gratuitously  and  those  who  pay.  The  system  was 
begun  in  1882,  and  it  has  grown  steadily  in  favor  and 
support.  In  1891  there  were  between  eight  million 
and  nine  million  meals  served,  considerably  more  than 
half  of  them  (nearly  sixty  per  cent.)  being  gratuitous. 
The  plan  rests  too  firmly  upon  common  sense  to  be 
abandoned.  Physical  as  well  as  mental  development 
is  the  object  of  the  schools,  and  in  any  case  free  text- 
books and  good  instruction  would  be  wasted  upon  a 
poor  child  suffering  from  the  bitter  pangs  of  hunger. 
Obviously,  the  teachers  could  not  manage  all  these 
extra  services  without  much  outside  assistance.  In 
point  of  fact,  the  cantines  scolaires,  or  school  restau- 
rants, are  in  charge  of  auxiliary  organizations  known 
as  caisses  des  fooles  (school  treasuries).  Originally 
the  caisse  d'ecole  was  an  informal  association  of  the 
adult  friends  of  a  particular  school,  each  member  of 
which  contributed  a  few  francs  a  year  for  prizes,  for 
acts  of  charity  to  poor  children,  and  for  various  pur- 
poses promotive  of  the  excellence  of  the  schools  and 


An 

established 
success. 


The  school 
treasury 
organiza- 
tions. 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


123 


the  well-being  of  the  children.  But  so  valuable  did 
they  prove  themselves  that  they  were  some  years  ago 
recognized  and  established  by  law.  The  municipal 
council  subsidizes  them  heavily,  and  makes  them  re- 
sponsible for  a  constantly  increasing  number  of  ser- 
vices. The  governing  board  of  each  caisse  contains 
several  ex-officio  members,  including  the  local  maire 
and  other  functionaries ;  but  the  members  themselves 
elect  from  their  own  body  a  controlling  majority  of 
the  board. 

It  is  through  the  caisses  des  e"coles  that  parents  of 
school-children,  and  all  other  friends  of  elementary 
education,  find  their  best  opportunity  to  come  into 
contact  with  the  life  and  work  of  the  schools.  Each 
regular  member  contributes  a  fixed  yearly  fee,  usu- 
ally ten  or  fifteen  francs ;  while  an  order  of  life  mem- 
bers, called  founders  (fondatewrs),  includes  those  who 
have  paid  in  advance  a  specified  sum,  usually  rang- 
ing from  one  hundred  to  two  hundred  francs.  Then 
there  are  the  donateurs  (donors),  who  subscribe  from 
year  to  year  without  being  held  to  any  definite 
amount.  The  sum  total  of  the  fees,  together  with 
the  amounts  that  are  raised  by  concerts  and  enter- 
tainments of  various  kinds,  gives  each  caisse  a  consid- 
erable fund  of  its  own.  The  managers  of  the  caisse 
are  able  to  ascertain  accurately  the  circumstances 
and  home  conditions  of  every  child  in  the  district. 
Out  of  their  fund  they  see  that  shoes  are  provided 
for  those  who  need  them,  and,  in  fact,  that  all  school- 
children are  comfortably  and  decently  attired.  They~ 
possess  the  knowledge  which  is  required  for  a  wise 
distribution  of  the  free  meal  tickets.  They  are  also 
in  a  position  to  determine  what  children  require  the- 
kindly  attentions  of  the  garderies.  Moreover,  in  many 
instances  the  good  offices  of  the  school  caisse  are  car- 
ried into  the  homes  of  poverty  to  relieve  sick  parents. 


CHAP.  I. 


Established 
by  law. 


Sources  of 
income. 


Their  vari- 
ous good 
offices. 


124 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Municipal 

promotion  of 

children's 

sports. 


School  va- 
cation trips 
and  camps. 


Boarding- 
schools  as  a 
new  feature 

of  the  sys- 
tem. 


Rapid  in- 
crease of  the 
"  internals." 


Upon  this  excellent  foundation  other  social  services 
to  poor  and  deserving  children  have  been  undertaken 
by  the  Paris  municipality.  Thus,  a  number  of  direc- 
tors of  sports  are  regularly  employed,  and  on  holi- 
days in  the  parks  and  playgrounds  the  young  Pari- 
sians are  now  being  officially  inducted  into  the  kinds 
of  outdoor  games  and  exercises  that  only  a  few  years 
ago  they  knew  so  little  about.  Every  year  the  city 
council  votes  a  handsome  sum  of  money  to  pay  for 
the  management  of  school  vacation  trips  into  the 
country;  and  an  important  system  of  school  camps 
and  colonies  has  been  established,  its  object  being  to 
send  a  large  number  of  sickly  children  of  the  work- 
ing-class into  the  country  in  summer. 

In  1882  —  the  year  from  which  date  most  of  the 
recent  developments  and  innovations  in  the  French 
school  system  —  it  was  determined  to  introduce  the 
boarding-school  feature  into  the  Paris  schools,  for  the 
benefit  of  widowers  or  of  other  parents  or  guardians 
whose  occupations  made  it  difficult  to  maintain  a 
suitable  home  environment  for  small  children.  Six 
hundred  francs  a  year  was  found  to  be  the  cost  of 
boarding  and  clothing  a  child  in  one  of  the  internats 
primaires,  and  the  municipality  consented  to  pay  the 
remainder  if  thirty-five  francs  per  month  were  ad- 
vanced by  the  parents  or  guardians.  In  1892  this 
payment  was  reduced  to  ten  francs  or  twenty  francs, 
according  to  the  pecuniary  circumstances  of  the 
persons  responsible  for  the  child.  At  the  beginning 
of  1893  there  were  seventy-five  of  these  internats, 
giving  homes  to  about  a  thousand  school-children 
between  the  ages  of  six  and  thirteen.  Under  the  new 
ten-franc  and  twenty-franc  monthly  rates,  the  num- 
ber has  increased  very  materially,  and  in  1894  the 
municipality  appropriated  approximately  one  million 
francs  to  pay  its  share  of  the  cost  of  placing  some 
two  thousand  children  in  the  internats  primaires. 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


125 


The  municipal  council  and  the  educational  author- 
ities have  recognized  the  necessity  of  regular  physical 
culture  as  well  as  of  outdoor  sport  and  recreation ;  and 
they  have  made  the  gymnasium,  under  professional 
instruction,  a  universal  feature  of  the  Paris  schools. 
Manual  training,  also,  in  the  use  of  common  tools  has 
been  recognized  for  its  educational  value  and  for  its 
practical  bearings,  and  there  are  nearly  150  ateliers 
or  workshops  connected  with  the  boys'  elementary 
schools,  in  which  regular  instruction  is  given.  Mean- 
while, the  girls  receive  corresponding  instruction  in 
needlework  and  the  domestic  arts. 

An  attempt  is  made  to  give  very  special  attention  to 
music  in  all  the  elementary  schools.  But  it  is  the  sys- 
tem of  instruction  in  drawing  and  design  that  is  most 
noteworthy.  No  effort  or  expense  is  spared  to  awaken 
the  art  instinct  and  to  develop  some  degree  of  tech- 
nical skill  in  the  future  artisans  of  Paris. 

But  it  is  in  the  continuation  schools  that  the  practical 
purpose  of  the  municipal  authorities  is  most  plainly 
evident.  Manual  training,  the  rudiments  of  design, 
familiarity  with  common  tools, —  these  can  be  taught 
in  the  primary  schools;  and  Paris  since  about  1880 
has  expended  many  millions  of  francs  in  establishing 
these  new  departures  in  elementary  education.  From 
the  primary  school  the  pupil  may  at  thirteen  go  into 
a  trade  as  an  apprentice,  and  provision  is  made  for  the 
continuance  of  his  studies  either  in  half -day  classes  or 
in  night-schools.  If  he  is  destined  for  a  scholar,  for  a 
place  in  the  civil  service,  or  for  a  calling  that  requires 
further  intellectual  training,  he  may  go  into  one  of  the 
ecoles  primaires  sup£rieures,  or  public  high  schools. 
These  are  admirable  institutions,  which  need  no  de- 
scription here.  But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  the  pupil 
be  destined  for  a  skilled  trade,  there  is  ready  for  him 
a  series  of  magnificent  ecoles  professionnelles  munici- 
pales,  which  furnish  technical  education  of  the  most 


CHAP.  I. 


The  gymna- 
sium in  all 
schools. 


School  work- 
shop for 
manual 
training. 


Music  and 
drawing. 


The  high 
schools. 


126 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Technical 
education. 


The  special 

trade 
schools. 


Kelation  of 

these 
schools  to 
Parisian 

prosperity. 


desirable  character,  adapted  directly  to  the  trades  that 
are  prosperously  domiciled  in  Paris.  One  of  these 
schools  (Ecole  Diderot)  is  devoted  to  the  group  of 
trades  that  pertain  to  the  working  of  wood  and  iron ; 
another  (Ecole  Bernard-Palissy)  to  the  decorative  arts 
— i.  e.,  to  the  application  of  fine  arts  to  industry ;  still  an- 
other to  the  trades  that  rest  upon  applications  of  chem- 
istry and  physics ;  another  to  the  furniture  and  uphol- 
stering industry;  another  includes  all  such  callings 
as  printing,  lithography,  bookbinding,  photography, 
photogravure,  and  the  many  new  mechanical  branches 
of  the  reproductive  arts;  and  there  are  still  others. 
Besides  the  group  of  technical  schools  for  boys,  there 
are  several  for  girls,  in  which  dressmaking,  millinery, 
and  various  other  industrial  arts,  as  well  as  the  do- 
mestic ones,  are  thoroughly  taught. 

American  and  English  visitors  at  the  Exposition  of 
1889  will  remember  the  remarkable  display  of  the 
Paris  industrial  schools,  especially  in  lines  of  deco- 
rative manufacture  and  art.  It  is  in  these  schools 
that  Parisian  dressmakers,  milliners,  artificial-flower 
makers,  furniture  designers,  house  decorators,  skilled 
workers  in  metals,  and  handicraftsmen  in  scores  of 
lines  of  industry  are  educated  to  do  the  things  that 
keep  Paris  prosperous  and  rich.  The  Exposition  of 
the  year  1900  will  have  much  more  to  present;  for 
these  technical  schools  are  constantly  improving  un- 
der the  fostering  care  of  the  municipal  government. 
It  is  public  money  wisely  spent  that  maintains  such 
an  educational  system.  I  need  not  refer  to  the  higher 
schools  of  science,  of  classics  and  literature,  and  of 
engineering.  All  the  flowers  of  civilization  are  en- 
couraged by  the  Paris  municipality. 

No  complete  impression  of  the  extent  to  which  in- 
struction in  the  practical  arts  is  carried  by  the  Pari- 
sians could  be  given  without  some  mention  of  the  great 


PARIS:   THE   TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


127 


number  of  popular  societies  and  non-governmental 
agencies  which  are  engaged  in  furthering  the  scientific, 
commercial,  and  industrial  education  of  adult  workers. 
Some  of  the  largest  of  these  societies  —  for  example, 
the  Association  Philotechnique — are  subsidized  by  the 
city  council.  This  particular  association,  founded  in 
1848,  enjoys  in  its  free  night  courses  the  unremuner- 
ated  services  of  more  than  five  hundred  accomplished 
professors  drawn  from  the  various  higher  educational 
institutions  that  are  centered  at  Paris.  The  state  and 
the  municipality  give  the  use  of  school  buildings,  and 
various  public  bodies  make  grants  and  donations  to 
aid  the  cause.  More  than  ten  thousand  adult  workers 
are  taught  every  year  in  the  admirable  special  courses 
of  the  Philotechnique.  Then  there  must  be  mentioned 
the  Association  Polytechnique,  which  is  more  indepen- 
dently conducted  by  the  workingmen  themselves,  and 
which  has  about  twenty-five  sections  in  Paris,  with 
more  than  four  hundred  courses,  taught  by  talented 
men  of  all  callings  and  professions,  who  are  glad  to 
give  their  services.  The  Union  Franchise  de  la  Jeu- 
nesse,  a  third  of  these  associations,  enjoys  official  aid 
and  recognition,  and  carries  on  several  hundred  classes 
in  Paris  every  year.  And  besides  these  there  are  scores 
of  smaller  societies  whose  educational  work  in  the  ag- 
gregate counts  for  a  great  deal.  Thus,  scores  of  thou- 
sands of  the  working-people  of  Paris  are  enjoying  some 
measure  of  instruction  that  tends  to  improve  the  ar- 
tistic and  technical  character  of  their  products. 

In  many  industrial  neighborhoods  of  Paris  there 
have  been  opened,  since  1886,  special  workingmen's 
libraries  of  industrial  art.  Lecture  courses  are  pro- 
vided in  connection  with  these  libraries,  and  costly 
works  are  loaned  to  artisans  for  home  study.  The 
experiment  is  accounted  a  most  satisfactory  one  in 
its  results.  It  is  under  direct  municipal  management. 


CHAP.  I. 


Voluntary 
societies  for 
technical  in- 
struction. 


Association 
Philotech- 
nique. 


Association 
Polytech- 
nique. 


Other  kin- 
dred move- 
ments. 


Libraries  of 

industrial 

art. 


128 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Activity  in 
the  library 
movement. 


The  school 
libraries. 


The  sixty-six 
municipal 
libraries. 


Central  li- 
brary 
bureau. 


Indeed,  in  few  directions  has  the  municipality  of 
Paris  been  more  active  during  the  past  decade  than 
in  the  promotion  of  libraries.  Paris  happens  to  con- 
tain, besides  the  national  library,  two  or  three  great 
reference  collections  of  books ;  and  the  recent  move- 
ment has  not  been  so  much  in  the  direction  of  central- 
ized aggregations  as  in  that  of  convenient  small  libra- 
ries, with  reading-rooms,  scattered  throughout  the  city. 
The  schools  are  all  supplied  with  their  own  libraries, 
of  which  more  or  less  use  is  made  by  parents  as  well 
as  scholars.  In  every  school  building  there  is  a  collec- 
tion of  the  reference  books  that  teachers  are  supposed 
to  need ;  then  a  second  collection  embraces  works  of 
reference  for  pupils,  while  a  third  department  of  the 
school  libraries  includes  carefully  chosen  books  to  be 
lent  to  the  pupils  for  home  reading. 

But  the  notable  thing  has  been  the  development  of 
the  system  of  free  municipal  libraries  for  popular  use 
in  all  the  quarters  of  Paris.  In  1878  there  were  about 
a  half-dozen  municipal  libraries  kept  in  the  mairie 
buildings  of  as  many  different  arrondissements.  But 
they  were  little  known  and  scarcely  frequented  at  all. 
It  was  in  that  year  that  the  central  municipal  author- 
ities determined  to  make  Paris  a  city  of  public  libra- 
ries. In  a  year  or  two  each  arrondissement  had  be- 
come an  active  library  center,  and  the  policy  of  opening 
additional  public  libraries  and  reading-rooms  in  the 
school  buildings  was  then  adopted.  In  1883  these  mu- 
nicipal libraries  numbered  twenty-six,  while  in  1893 
they  had  grown  to  the  remarkable  number  of  sixty- 
six.  They  are  open  in  the  evening  and  at  other  hours 
convenient  for  working-people,  and  they  have  become 
a  powerful  factor  in  the  educational  and  home  life  of 
the  Parisian  people. 

A  central  bureau  exercises  general  oversight,  and 
keeps  the  library  system  in  harmony;  while  local 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  129 

boards   in   every  arrondissemeut  exercise  ordinary     CHAP.  i. 
control,  select  the  books  to  be  purchased,  and  pro- 
mote the  general  usefulness  of  the  libraries  of  their 
own  district.     The  local  maire,  his  adjuncts,  the  four 
members  of  the  municipal  council  from  the  arron- 

*  Arrondisse- 

dissement,  certain  school  and  other  officials,  and  a  mentboards. 
group  of  appointed  citizens  form  the  arroudissement 
library  board. 

There  are,  besides  the  municipal  libraries,  about 
twenty  useful  free  public  libraries  under  the  auspices 
of  a  private  association,  which  are  partly  supported 
by  yearly  grants  from  the  municipal  treasury.  Thus,  Library  8ys- 

_  J   J  J  °  .  e    •     i  '    i  i  .  tern  summed 

including  the  libraries  of  industrial  art,  which  are  up- 
under  full  municipal  control,  the  Paris  authorities 
are  in  possession  of  a  system  of  about  one  hundred 
small  but  exceedingly  useful  free  lending  libraries, 
domiciled  in  every  part  of  the  city.  These  have  by 
no  means  begun  to  approach  the  maximum  of  their 
influence,  for  the  Parisians  are  only  now  forming  the 
habit  of  library  patronage ;  but  they  are  lending  more 
than  two  million  volumes  a  year,  of  which  less  than 
half  are  works  of  fiction. 

The  policy  of  municipal  Paris  for  the  promotion 
of  the  fine  arts  might  well  be  studied  by  the  practical 
administrators  of  other  countries.  It  has  not  been 
easy  for  English  cities,  and  it  has  been  still  more  Parisian  Poi- 
difficult  for  American  municipalities,  to  perceive  the  thefineWarts. 
immense  commercial  benefits  that  may  accrue  from  a 
generous  cultivation  of  the  esthetic  arts.  The  na- 
tional French  government  maintains  its  world-famed 
art-schools ;  the  Parisian  local  authorities  patronize 
art  in  a  variety  of  ways;  the  greatest  artists  and 
most  accomplished  connoisseurs  are  brought  into  the 
service  of  the  national  or  the  municipal  government 
as  members  of  commissions  which  supervise  art  in- 
struction, pass  upon  plans  for  the  architecture  and 

9 


130 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUKOPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Preeminence 
iu  art  sus- 
tained at 
small  ex- 
pense. 


The  fine  art 
fund. 


Mural  de- 
signs for 
civic  build- 
ings. 


decoration  of  public  buildings,  award  prizes  in  art 
competitions,  select  pictures  for  public  galleries,  and 
pass  judgment  upon  designs  for  public  monuments 
or  statues. 

The  appearance  of  great  activity  in  all  these  mat- 
ters has  naturally  enough  created  an  impression  in 
the  minds  of  foreign  visitors  that  French  public 
expenditure  on  account  of  the  beaux-arts  must  be 
upon  an  extremely  lavish  scale.  This  impression, 
however,  is  wholly  erroneous.  It  is  a  very  moderate 
demand,  comparatively,  that  art  makes  upon  the  pub- 
lic revenues.  The  conspicuous  results  are  due  to  the 
fact  of  a  continuous  policy,  which  is  so  wisely  ad- 
justed that  a  yearly  minimum  of  cash  outlay  results 
in  a  maximum  of  encouragement  to  art,  and  suffices 
to  turn  the  balance  in  favor  of  Paris  as  the  art  center 
of  the  world. 

Before  1870  the  municipal  credit  of  250,000  francs 
a  year  for  the  encouragement  of  art  was,  for  the  most 
part,  expended  upon  pictures  or  other  adornments 
for  the  great  churches  of  Paris.  But  since  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  republic  a  broader  policy  has  been 
pursued.  Especially  since  1880  there  has  been  a 
wonderful  outburst  of  enthusiasm  and  of  genius  in 
the  painting  of  appropriate  mural  designs  for  the 
series  of  civic  buildings.  The  mairie  buildings  of 
the  twenty  arrondissements  —  in  which,  as  I  have 
already  explained,  the  administrative  tasks  of  the 
municipality  have  their  working  centers  —  have,  for 
the  most  part,  been  rebuilt  or  enlarged  since  1872 ; 
and  the  fine-art  fund  has  secured  for  them  many 
noteworthy  mural  paintings  of  historical  or  allegori- 
cal significance,  the  subjects  being  suggested  by  the 
local  surroundings,  or  by  the  uses  of  the  rooms  deco- 
rated. In  like  manner  the  school-buildings  are  re- 
receiving  noble  decoration,  and  every  worthy  phase 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


131 


Mode  of  ex- 
penditure. 


of  the  life  and  history  of  Paris,  ancient  and  modern,  CHAP.  i. 
is  finding  expression  on  the  walls  of  public  buildings. 
The  artists  are  commissioned  under  circumstances 
which,  while  helping  many  a  rising  young  artist  to 
gain  position  and  prestige,  also  secure  the  largest 
possible  amount  and  variety  of  work  for  the  sum 
that  has  been  set  aside.  Of  course  the  greatest  of 
the  French  painters  have  been  glad  to  put  their  ser- 
vices at  the  command  of  the  authorities,  for  very 
modest  compensation,  to  aid  in  decorating  the  new 
Hotel  de  Ville,  the  new  Sorbonne,  and  other  of  the 
chief  public  buildings.  The  sculptors  have  been  no 
less  constantly  recognized,  by  similar  methods.  A 
certain  sum  is  always  expended  every  year  by  the 
municipal  authorities  in  the  purchase  of  new  works 
from  the  various  salons  and  exhibitions. 

It  was  in  1816  that  the  municipal  service  of  the 
fine  arts  was  established,  and  in  1875  it  was  deter-  A  municipal 
mined  to  prepare  and  publish  an  inventory,  or  ex- 
planatory catalogue,  of  the  works  of  fine  art  of  all 
kinds  that  had  been  accumulated  by  the  municipality. 
That  catalogue  had,  up  to  1892,  cost  more  than  one 
hundred  thousand  francs,  and  it  still  calls  for  a 
yearly  appropriation.  A  number  of  magnificent  vol- 
umes have  appeared  in  the  series,  and  an  inspection 
of  them  would  convey  some  faint  idea  of  the  mar- 
velous wealth  of  art  objects  and  architectural  monu- 
ments that  has  accrued  to  the  Parisian  community 
through  a  policy  of  encouragement  and  acquisition 
intelligently  followed  for  eighty  years. 

This  willingness  to  spend  some  thousands  of  francs 
to  record  the  history  of  the  fine-art  development  of 
Paris  is,  indeed,  characteristic  of  a  general  policy 
that  was  entered  upon  some  years  ago.  The  service 
known  as  that  of  the  Travaux  Historiques  was  begun 
in  the  decade  before  the  war  with  Germany.  But  it 


art  inven- 
tory. 


The  "Tra- 
vaux His- 
toriques." 


132 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


Carnavalet 
museum. 


Commemo- 
rative tab- 
lets. 


The  "  Gen- 
eral History 
of  Paris." 


Magnitude 
of  the  under- 
taking. 


was  not  until  after  the  war  that  it  took  its  present 
form  as  one  of  the  regular  branches  of  the  municipal 
administration.  This  service  comprises  three  princi- 
pal parts.  First,  it  maintains  the  Carnavalet  museum 
and  library,  devoted  to  the  preservation  of  objects  of 
archaeological  value,  and  to  the  collection  of  manu- 
scripts and  books  pertaining  to  the  history  of  Paris. 
Second,  it  has  charge  of  the  preparation  and  erec- 
tion of  commemorative  tablets, — of  which  a  hundred 
or  more  have  been  placed  since  1879, — to  mark  his- 
torical spots  like  the  site  of  the  Bastille,  or  to  designate 
houses  or  localities  associated  with  the  names  of  fa- 
mous men.  Third,  it  promotes  investigations  in  spe- 
cial fields  of  Parisian  history  and  publishes  the  results. 
It  is  this  third  function  of  the  historical  service 
that  is  most  noteworthy.  I  have  endeavored,  in  my 
account  of  the  work  of  the  Paris  municipality  in  the 
period  since  1873,  to  make  it  clear  that  its  devotion 
has  not  been  solely  or  chiefly  to  ostentatious  material 
projects, —  to  boulevards,  ornate  facades,  or  showy 
monuments.  But  nothing,  as  it  would  seem  to  me, 
more  satisfactorily  illustrates  the  thorough  and  gen- 
uine quality  of  the  civilization  that  dominates  these 
Parisian  circles  of  government  than  the  faithful  sup- 
port for  more  than  twenty  years  given  to  the  scholars 
and  savants  who  are  preparing  L'Histoire  Generate 
de  Paris."  Especially  to  be  praised  are  their  noble  vol- 
umes devoted  to  the  Paris  of  1789, — so  invaluable  in 
their  preservation  for  future  ages  of  the  facts  con- 
cerning the  streets,  buildings,  and  manifold  condi- 
tions of  the  city  at  the  beginning  of  the  Revolution. 
But  many  elaborate  studies  relating  to  earlier  periods 
in  the  history  of  Paris  have  also  been  published,  and 
each  year  adds  two  or  three  new  ones  to  a  collection 
that  now  numbers  perhaps  fifty  volumes.  From  1873 
to  1896  the  municipal  council  had  appropriated  about 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  133 

two  million  francs  for  the  carrying  out  of  this  scheme     CHAP.  i. 
of  historical  inquiry  and  publication.    The  money 
has  not  been  extravagantly  spent,  and  the  project 
has  been  creditable  to  the  Parisian  sense  of  muni- 
cipal dignity  and  historical  pride. 

These  historical  labors  are,  for  administrative  pur- 
poses, brought  under  the  auspices  of  the  same  bureau 
that  is  charged  with  the  service  of  fine  arts.  The 
general  chapter-heading  of  "Architecture  and  Fine 
Arts"  in  the  yearly  budget  includes  outlays  for  a 
number  of  services  that  are  grouped  together  in  the 
practical  organization  of  the  prefect's  executive  staff. 
Under  this  category  falls  the  yearly  outlay  of  300,000  outlay  for 
francs  for  the  celebration  of  the  national  holiday,  honday.1* 
July  14 ;  a  subvention  for  the  encouragement  of  musi- 
cal compositions  is  also  included ;  and  to  indicate  the 
wide  and  catholic  range  of  the  municipal  patronage, 
it  should  be  mentioned  that  through  this  bureau  is 
expended  the  70,000  francs  which  the  council  votes 
every  year  as  its  contribution  toward  the  encourage- 

"  .  .  .  ~        Subscription 

meut  of  horse-racing,  most  of  this  sum  being  devoted  (tothe 
to  the  well-known  Grand  Prix  de  Paris,  to  which  the  prS!" 
municipality  has  subscribed  since  1872. 

The  value  of  a  thoroughly-organized  statistical  ser- 
vice can  be  appreciated,  perhaps,  by  some  practical 
minds  which  would  hesitate  to  approve  the  expendi- 
ture of  municipal  funds  upon  recondite  historical 

„,,..,£  »  T»      •  -i  T116  statisti- 

inquiries.  The  statistical  office  of  Paris  until  recent  cai  bureau. 
years  was  not  as  highly  developed  or  as  well  sup- 
ported as  it  ought  to  have  been ;  and  even  yet  it  does 
not  occupy  so  conspicuous  a  position  in  the  adminis- 
trative life  and  work  as,  for  example,  that  of  Berlin. 
But  it  has  attained  an  excellent  standing,  and  its 
reports  are  admirable  examples  of  statistical  com- 
pilation. A  distinguished  specialist  is  chief  of  the 
statistical  office,  and  he  is  supported  by  a  commis- 

9* 


134  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  sion  whose  members  appreciate  the  important  rela- 
tion that  statistical  science  must  henceforth  bear  to 
progress  in  every  field  of  public  administration.1 

As  the  foregoing  description  of  municipal  develop- 
ments and  activities  has  proceeded  from  one  point  to 
another,  it  has  been  made  plain  that  immense  finan- 
cial operations  were  involved.  The  projects  which 
have  been  reviewed  in  these  pages  could  not  have 
been  accomplished  without  the  accumulation  of  a 
vast  municipal  debt.  Nor  could  the  current  expenses 
of  so  elaborate  an  administration  be  met  without  the 
collection  of  a  very  generous  yearly  revenue.  It  re- 
mains therefore  for  me  to  give  some  account  of  the 
financial  condition  and  methods  of  the  Parisian 
municipality. 

The  debt  of  Paris  amounts  at  the  present  time  to 
A  debt  of     nearly  two  billion  francs.     This  huge  obligation  is 
francs.      represented  by  the  great  public  works  of  Paris,  in- 
cluding the  modern  system  of  streets  and  boulevards, 
the  water-supply,  the  drainage  works,  the  parks  and 

1  Dr.  Jacques  Bertillon  is  chief  of  the  Paris  statistical  service. 
It  may  be  of  interest  to  present  the  list  of  members  of  the  com- 
mission, not  only  because  of  what  it  reveals  as  to  the  distin- 
guished character  of  the  men  who  serve  upon  this  important 
board,  but  also  because  it  represents  very  fairly  the  personal  qual- 
lity  of  many  other  advisory  boards  and  commissions,  that  are 
bringing  the  highest  professional  abilities  into  the  service  of  mu- 
nicipal Paris.  The  following  twenty-eight  gentlemen  constituted 
in  1894  the  Commission  de  Statistique  Municipals  :  Eugene  Rene 
Poubelle,  prefet  de  la  Seine ;  L6on  David  Bruman,  secretaire 
general  de  la  prefecture  de  la  Seine ;  Jacques  Bertillon,  docteur 
en  medecine,  chef  des  travaux  de  la  statistique  municipale  ;  M. 
Bezancon,  chef  de  division  a  la  prefecture  de  police ;  Adolphe 
Bloch,  docteur  en  medecine,  medecin-adjoint  de  la  prefecture  de 
la  Seine ;  M.  Chautemps,  docteur  en  medecine,  depute  de  la 
Seine;  Arthur  Chervin,  docteur  en  medecine;  M.  Cheysson,  in- 
specteur  general  des  ponts-et-chaussees,  professeur  a  1'Ecole  des 
Sciences  Politiques ;  Jean  Jules  Clamageran,  senateur ;  Emile 
Ferry,  maire  du  IXe  arrondissement,  ancien  depute  de  la  Seine ; 


PAEIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  135 

their  improvement,  the  new  Hotel  de  Ville,  the  pre-  CHAP.  i. 
fectoral  and  mairie  buildings,  several  hundred  new 
school-buildings,  many  other  pieces  of  public  archi- 
tecture, the  magnificent  embankments  of  the  river 
Seine,  the  series  of  beautiful  and  indestructible 
bridges,  the  great  markets  and  entrepots,  including  'mentT" 
the  municipal  slaughter-houses  and  cattle-yards,  and 
a  host  of  other  investments  of  a  permanent  and  credi- 
table nature,  many  of  which  I  have  already  described. 
The  critics  of  the  financial  policy  pursued  under  the 
prefecture  of  Baron  Haussmann  have  brought  to- 
gether an  array  of  facts  and  arguments  which  show 
it  to  be  undoubtedly  true  that  extravagance  and  cor- 
ruption to  some  extent  characterized  the  methods  of 
that  period  of  rapid  transformation  and  of  accom-  The  question 

.  ofextrava- 

panymg  excitement  and  speculation.    Nevertheless,      gance. 
I  am  of  opinion  that  the  modernization  of  Paris  has, 
in  the  main,  been  soundly  and  ably  financiered,  and 
that  no  very  appreciable  percentage  of  the  outstand- 

M.  Girard,  chef  du  laboratoire  municipal  de  chimie ;  M.  Jacques, 
depute  de  la  Seine ;  Jean  Adrien  Jaubert,  docteur  en  medecine, 
inspecteur  de  la  verification  des  d6ces ;  Pierre  Francois  Rene" 
Lafabreque,  ancien  directeur  de  1'Hospice  des  Enf ants- Assisted ; 
Alfred  Martial  Lamouroux,  docteur  en  rne'decine,  membre  du 
conseil  municipal  de  Paris ;  M.  Lemoine,  ing^nieur  en  chef  des 
ponts-et-chauss4es ;  Augustin  Henri  Antonin  Le  Roux,  directeur 
des  affaires  de"partementales  a  la  prefecture  de  la  Seine ;  Emile 
Levasseur,  membre  de  1'Institut ;  Toussaint  Loua,  ancien  chef 
du  bureau  de  la  statistique  gen<§rale  de  France  au  ministere  du 
commerce ;  Marie  Georges  Hippolyte  Martin,  docteur  en  mede- 
cine, ancien  se"nateur ;  M.  Mascart,  directeur  du  bureau  central 
me'te'orologique ;  Georges  Pallain,  conseiller  d'etat,  directeur  au 
ministere  des  finances ;  Alphonse  Pelletier,  directeur  honoraire 
de  1'administration  g6nerale  a  la  prefecture  de  la  Seine  ;  M.  Pi- 
cot,  juge  de  paix  du  III6  arrondissement ;  Georges  Renaud,  di- 
recteur de  la  "Revue  Geographique  Internationale";  Jules 
Adolphe  Socquet,  docteur  en  medecine ;  Jules  Worms,  medecin 
honoraire  de  la  prefecture  de  la  Seine ;  Emile  Contant,  sous-chef 
du  service  de  la  statistique  municipale. 


136 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 


The  great 

Parisian 

loans. 


Method  of 
repayment. 


Prize 
premiums. 


Average  in- 
terest rate. 


ing  debt  can  be  chargeable  to  gross  mistakes  or  im- 
proprieties. At  any  rate,  the  modern  Paris  is  worth 
to  its  people  every  franc  that  it  has  cost. 

The  municipal  debt  affords  the  thrifty  citizen  the 
most  popular  form  of  investment  for  his  savings. 
The  method  of  issue  may  be  briefly  explained.  Hav- 
ing decided  upon  the  general  policy  to  be  pursued  in 
the  construction  of  public  works  for  a  few  years  to 
come,  the  administration  obtains  authority  to  borrow 
a  prescribed  amount,  usually  in  several  yearly  instal- 
ments. Thus  in  1886  it  was  decided  to  raise  a  new 
loan  of  277,000,000  francs,  and  in  1892  another  loan 
of  200,000,000  was  further  determined  upon.  The 
loan  of  1886,  it  was  decided,  should  consist  of  about 
seven  hundred  thousand  shares  of  400  francs  value 
each,  to  be  issued  from  time  to  time  during  a  period 
of  eleven  years. 

The  terms  and  circumstances  of  each  approaching 
issue  are  duly  advertised,  and  opportunity  is  given 
to  every  one  to  subscribe  at  the  mairies  of  the  twenty 
arrondissements.  It  invariably  happens  that  the 
popular  subscription  for  a  municipal  loan  far  out- 
runs the  amount  asked  by  the  authorities.  The  plan 
of  repayment  is  that  of  gradual  liquidation  or  amor- 
tizemeut.  A  certain  number  of  shares  are  paid  off 
each  year,  the  particular  bonds  being  selected  by  lot. 
A  considerable  sum  of  money  is  divided  as  prizes, 
upon  a  lottery  system,  among  those  whose  shares  are 
called  for  liquidation.  This  premium  or  prize  sys- 
tem, with  its  element  of  uncertainty,  doubtless  adds 
not  a  little  to  the  popularity  of  the  municipal  loans. 
The  amounts  set  aside  for  prizes  are  of  course  care- 
fully calculated,  and  they  are  to  be  considered  as  in 
effect  a  portion  of  the  interest  charge.  Including 
the  premiums,  the  entire  Parisian  loan  is  now  out- 
standing at  an  average  yearly  interest  of  about  three 


PAKIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  137 

and  one  half  per  cent.,  the  more  recent  issues  being     CHAP.  i. 
at  a  somewhat  lower  rate. 

As  a  criticism  of  the  French  system  of  prize  draw- 
ings it  may  be  urged  that, — while  municipal  loans  objections 
certainly  ought  to  be  subdivided  into  small  shares  so  drawings!6 
that  they  may  be  available  as  an  investment  for  the 
savings  of  industrious  citizens, — there  ought  to  be 
no  devices  connected  with  the  issue  which  would 
tend  to  make  the  development  of  public  debt  unduly 
popular,  thus  militating  against  a  severe  scrutiny  of 
public  expenditures.  If  municipal  bonds  were  not  so 
popularly  sought  after  as  an  investment,  the  authori- 
ties of  Paris  would  perhaps  be  compelled  to  carry 
on  the  public  business  with  a  considerably  smaller 
amount  of  borrowed  capital  than  they  are  now  using. 

The  great  loans  (emprunts)  of  Paris  upon  which 
payments  are  still  due,  and  which  therefore  enter 
into  the  outstanding  volume  of  public  debt,  may 

„    ,  .,     ,    ,     f  *     Outstanding 

well  be  recapitulated.  loans. 

The  loan  authorized  by  the  law  of  May  2,  1855, 
consisted  of  150,000  shares  emitted  at  400  francs  each 
and  payable  at  500  each,  the  principal  of  the  debt  be- 
ing thus  75,000,000  francs.  It  was  payable  in  semi-  , 

'  *    J  The  loan  of 

annual  instalments,  beginning  in  1858  and  running  ™M. 
through  forty  years.  Each  outstanding  share  draws 
as  interest  15  francs  a  year ;  and  at  each  semi-annual 
calling  in  of  shares  there  are  distributed  by  lot  150,000 
francs  in  fifteen  prizes.  Thus  up  to  January  1,  1895, 
there  had  been  canceled  131,595  of  the  original  150,- 
000  shares,  and  65,797,500  francs  of  the  principal  had 
been  extinguished,  while  56,936,976  francs  of  interest 
money  and  11,850,000  in  prizes  had  been  paid  out. 
On  the  first  day  of  September,  1897,  the  last  payments 
will  have  been  made,  and  thus  the  loan  of  1855  will 
be  wholly  extinguished.  These  details  will  make  clear 
the  modus  operandi  of  all  the  Parisian  loans. 


138  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.         The  next  great  loan  was  authorized  by  the  law  of 
August  1,  1860.    Its  nominal  capital  was  143,809,000 

Loan  of  isoo.  francs,  consisting  of  287,618  shares  emitted  at  475 
francs  and  payable  at  500,  and  of  122,785  shares 
emitted  at  450  and  payable  at  500.  The  conditions  as 
to  interest,  drawings,  and  premiums  were  the  same  as 
in  the  preceding  loan,  except  that  the  whole  amount 
was  to  be  liquidated  in  37  years  after  September  1, 
1860.  This  provides  its  final  extinction  upon  the  very 
same  date  (September  1,  1897)  as  that  of  the  loan  of 
1855. 
Five  years  later,  in  July,  1865,  a  loan  of  300,000,000 

Loan  of  1865.  francs  was  authorized,  to  be  issued  in  600,000  shares 
at  450  francs  each  and  payable  at  500,  liquidation  to 
begin  in  1869  and  to  be  completed  on  February  1, 
1929.  These  shares  earn  20  francs  each  per  annum 
as  interest,  and  1,140,000  francs  per  annum  is  the 
bonus  distributed  by  lot. 

The  next  loan  was  also  one  of  approximately  300,- 
000,000  francs,  and  it  was  authorized  in  April,  1869. 

Loan  of  i860.  The  issue  comprised  753,623  shares,  sold  at  345  francs 
each  but  payable  at  400,  and  amortization  began  in 
July,  1869,  and  will  extend  through  a  40-year  term  to 
July,  1909.  The  prizes  allotted  are  fifteen  each  quarter, 
or  sixty  per  annum,  and  they  amount  to  1,000,000 
francs  a  year,  the  interest  being  at  the  rate  of  12 
francs  a  year  on  each  share. 

A  law  of  September,  1871,  authorized  a  great  loan 
of  about  510,000,000  francs.     This  was  a  time  when 

Loan  of  i87i.  French  credit  was  strained  by  war;  and  the  400-franc 
shares  (nearly  1,300,000  in  number)  were  emitted  at 
270  francs,  the  interest  being  12  francs,  and  the  prize 
drawings  amounting  to  1,500,000  a  year  in  352  dif- 
ferent prizes.  This  loan  was  to  be  paid  off  in  300 
quarterly  instalments,  covering  the  75  years  from 
1872  to  1946. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  139 

The  loan  authorized  in  December,  1874,  was  for  the     CHAP.  i. 
nominal  sum  of  250,000,000  francs,  and  was  to  be 
amortized  in  the  period  from  1875  to  1950.     There  Loanofi874. 
were  issued  500,000  separate  obligations  of  a  face 
value  of  500  francs  (marketed  at  480  francs),  drawing 
an  annual  interest  of  20  francs,  and  having  the  usual 
prize-drawing  features. 

In  1876,  a  new  loan  of  129,000,000  was  sanctioned, 
in  500-franc  shares  emitted  at  465  francs,  with  an-  Loanofisre. 
nual  interest  of  20  francs,  an  amortization  period  of 
73  years,  and  500,000  francs  each  year  as  prizes. 

A  law  of  1886  authorized  a  loan  of  277,500,000  francs, 
to  be  issued  in  instalments  during  a  period  of  11  years,  Loanofisso. 
and  to  be  repayable  through  75  years  after  1897.  The 
shares  (nearly  seven  hundred  thousand  in  number)  are 
of  the  400-franc  denomination,  and  have  been  emitted 
at  prices  ranging  from  375  to  384  francs.  They  draw 
12  francs  yearly  interest,  and  the  annual  prize  money 
is  1,000,000  francs. 

The  most  recent  of  the  great  Paris  loans  was  author- 
ized by  a  law  of  July,  1892,  the  capital  amount  being 
200,000,000.  It  was  to  be  issued  in  several  instalments  Loanofi892. 
and  to  be  repaid  in  the  usual  way  during  a  long  period, 
with  prize  drawings.  The  popular  demand  for  these 
shares  has  been  great  enough  to  float  a  loan  twenty 
times  as  large. 

A  debt  of  about  283,000,000  francs  to  the  Credit 
Foncier  was,  under  terms  of  an  arrangement  which    Debt  to  the 
became  effective  in  1880,  reduced  to  the  form  of  a  loan    J  cier. 
to  be  repaid  in  117  semi-annual  payments  of  6,000,000 
francs  each,  this  sum  covering  interest  and  a  portion 
of  the  principal.     The  Credit  Foncier,  which  may  be 
characterized  as  a  national  mortgage  or  land  bank, 
had  made  heavy  advances  to  the  municipality  in  fur- 
therance of  the  Haussmann-Napoleon  expenditures; 
and  the  debt  has  now  taken  the  form  mentioned  above. 


140  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  From  time  to  time  important  public  works  have 
been  constructed  for  Paris  by  firms  or  companies 

other  annui-  which  received  their  pay  in  the  form  of  annuities  run- 
ties  OUt-  .  •-!         mi  -I 

standing,  mng  through  a  long  period.  This  plan,  also,  has  been 
pursued  in  the  purchase  of  the  plants  of  suburban 
water  companies.  About  144,000,000  francs  of  indebt- 
edness has  been  thus  incurred  since  1855,  about  80,000,- 
000  of  which  remained  outstanding  in  1895. 

Summing  up  the  various  issues  of  interest-bearing 
obligations,  it  appears  that  from  1855  to  1895  the 
fth     rouflicipality  had  borrowed,  in  round  figures,  2,400,- 
debtein°i895.  000,000  francs,  of  which  at  the  beginning  of  1895 
there  remained  outstanding  1,850,000,000.     The  ex- 
tinction of  the  principal  has  of  late  proceeded  at  the 
rate  of  about  30,000,000  francs  a  year,  nearly  80,000,- 
000  more  being  required  for  interest  and  prizes. 

The   municipal    expenditures    for   the   year   1894 

amounted  in  round  figures  to  somewhat  more  than 

Annuaiout-    three  nun(jre^  an(j  thirty-six  million  francs.    This 

sum  included  nearly  fifty  million  francs  raised  by 
loans  for  what  are  considered  as  extraordinary  ex- 
penses ;  that  is  to  say,  for  the  cost  of  various  perma- 
nent improvements.  The  ordinary  expenses  for  the 
year  1894  were  287,000,000  francs.  Of  this  amount 
a  little  more  than  one  hundred  and  nine  million 
francs  was  required  to  meet  charges  upon  the  pub- 

Cliarge  upon  . 

debt.  lie  debt.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  public  debt  occa- 
sions a  yearly  outlay  amounting  to  nearly  two  fifths 
of  the  total  ordinary  expenditure.  The  several  items 
of  administrative  outlay  occupy  almost  the  same  rela- 
tive position  from  year  to  year.  The  largest  is  always 
that  of  the  prefecture  of  police.  As  I  have  already 
?"  explained,  the  police  administration  covers  a  number 
of  minor  services  besides  the  business  of  the  police 
force  proper.  The  total  budget  of  the  police  depart- 
ment somewhat  exceeds  twenty-nine  million  francs. 


PARIS:  THE  TYPICAL  MODEEN  CITY 


141 


It  should  be  remembered  that  about  ten  million  five 
hundred  thousand  francs,  or  somewhat  more  than 
one  third  the  cost  of  the  police  administration,  is 
met  by  a  subvention  from  the  national  treasury. 
The  public  schools  and  the  work  of  public  charity 
(assistance  publique)  are  next  in  importance  as 
spending  departments,  and  entail  about  equal  annual 
charges  upon  the  municipal  treasury.  Each  of  these 
services  for  the  year  1894  required  appropriations  of 
approximately  twenty-six  million  francs.  They  had 
cost  in  1892  a  little  more  than  twenty-four  million 
francs  each.  The  recent  tendency  seems  to  be  an  in- 
crease for  each  of  these  departments  of  about  a  million 
francs  a  year.  The  appropriation  of  1894  for  street 
services  (voie  publique),  including  paving,  cleansing, 
and  some  other  items,  reached  a  total  of  about 
twenty-three  million  seven  hundred  thousand  francs. 
The  same  item  in  1892  was  a  little  in  excess  of 
twenty-one  million  francs.  This  did  not  include  the 
care  of  the  parks  and  parkways  and  the  item  of 
public  illumination,  which,  taken  together,  entail  a 
constant  yearly  charge  of  approximately  twelve 
million  francs.1 

Out  of  a  total  ordinary  income  for  1894  of  approxi- 
mately two  hundred  and  eighty-seven  million  francs, 
less  than  thirty-three  million  five  hundred  thousand 
francs  were  secured  by  direct  taxation.  Nearly  one 
hundred  and  fifty  million  five  hundred  thousand 
francs  were  collected  from  the  octroi.  In  a  following 
chapter  I  shall  give  some  account  of  the  octroi  sys- 
tem in  general  as  prevailing  in  France.  It  may 
suffice,  therefore,  to  remark  at  this  point  that  the 
octroi  dues  are  local  customs  collected  upon  various 

JFor  other  items  of  municipal  outlay,  see  the  condensed 
budget  for  1894  in  tabulated  form  which  appears  in  the  appen- 
dix of  this  volume. 


CHAP.  I. 


Bills  for 
schools  and 
for  charity. 


Cost  of  street 
services. 


Parks  and 
lighting. 


Sources  of 
income. 


Octroi  sys- 
tem. 


142  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  i.  classes  of  commodities  brought  into  a  city  for  con- 
sumption. The  articles  usually  taxed  in  this  man- 
ner are  standard  necessities  of  life,  including  provi- 
sions, beverages,  and  building  materials.  The  statis- 
tics of  the  Paris  octroi  for  a  recent  year  show  that 
48,000,000  francs  were  collected  upon  wines,  and 
more  than  sixteen  millions  upon  alcoholic  and  dis- 

Articles 

from  which    tilled  liquors —  the  total  amount  under  this  general 

octroi  dues  x  .  .  ° 

are  collected,  schedule  of  drinks  (boissons)  exceeding  sixty-five 
million  francs.  Upon  vinegars,  oils,  essences,  and 
liquids  other  than  beverages,  more  than  seventeen 
million  francs  were  collected.  The  amount  upon 
meats  was  approximately  twenty  million  francs,  this 
general  category  being  swelled  to  33,000,000  francs 
by  the  inclusion  of  fish,  oysters,  butter,  cheese,  and 
eggs.  Upon  articles  of  fuel,  including  wood,  coal, 
charcoal,  etc.,  nearly  fourteen  million  francs  were 
collected,  while  as  much  more  was  levied  upon  lum- 
ber and  various  building  materials.  Other  articles 
—  chiefly  bulky  substances  such  as  provender  for 
horses  —  accounted  for  several  million  francs  in  ad- 
dition to  the  amounts  mentioned,  making  a  total  of 
octroi  receipts  in  excess  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
million  francs. 

It  may  be  noted  that  it  costs  somewhat  more  than 
nine  million  francs  to  maintain  the  Parisian  octroi 

cost  of  oc-    administration.      The  criticism  is   sometimes  urged 

troi  admin-      .,,.,  /,.-,  .  •  -i      j.  /> 

that  the  expense  of  the  system  is  excessive ;  but  6  per 
cent,  would  perhaps  be  absorbed  in  the  cost  of  levy, 
collection,,  and  accounting  if  an  equal  sum  were  to 
be  obtained  by  some  other  method.  In  defense  of 
the  octroi  it  may  be  remarked  that  the  people  of 
Paris,  as  of  many  other  continental  cities,  are  accus- 
tomed to  this  indirect  mode  of  contributing  to  muni- 
cipal revenues,  and  a  majority  of  them  would  prob- 
ably prefer  it  to  any  system  of  direct  taxation. 


PARIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY 


143 


Further,  let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  direct  taxes 
levied  by  the  national  government  itself  fall  very 
heavily  upon  property  and  upon  almost  every  kind 
of  business.  In  the  succeeding  chapter  I  shall  de- 
scribe the  French  system  of  direct  taxes,  under  which 
the  local  authorities  raise  a  portion  of  their  revenue 
by  adding  a  certain  rate  for  municipal  purposes  to 
the  general  rate  levied  by  the  national  government. 
If  the  octroi  dues  fall  largely  upon  the  masses  of  the 
people  as  consumers,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  the 
municipal  revenues  are  expended  for  their  particular 
benefit. 

In  the  budget  of  1894  the  sum  of  33,368,300  francs 
is  credited  to  the  municipality's  share  in  the  levy  of 
direct  taxes, —  this  amount  being  collected  with  the 
taxes  of  the  national  government  and  paid  over  to 
the  municipal  treasury.  Deducting  the  receipts  from 
the  octroi  and  from  direct  taxes,  there  remains  103,- 
000,000  francs  of  ordinary  revenue  derived  from 
other  sources.  The  receipts  of  the  water  department 
amount  to  nearly  16,000,000  francs,  and  the  public 
revenue  from  the  gas  company  is  almost  as  large. 
About  10,500,000  francs  comes  from  the  national  trea- 
sury as  a  contribution  toward  the  expense  of  the 
police  department.  More  than  8,000,000  francs  is 
received  as  gross  income  from  the  public  markets; 
more  than  6,000,000  accrues  from  the  sums  paid  to 
the  city  by  street  railway,  omnibus,  and  cab  compa- 
nies; and  from  2,000,000  francs  to  4,000,000  francs 
each  is  received  from  (1)  the  abattoirs,  (2)  the  en- 
trep6ts,  (3)  the  cemeteries,  (4)  the  rental  of  minor 
street  privileges. 

It  has  perhaps  been  made  sufficiently  clear,  in  my 
account  of  the  various  departments  of  administra- 
tion, that  a  constant  increase  of  municipal  revenue 


CHAP.  I. 


The  direct 
taxes. 


144 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  I. 

Future  finan- 
cial policy. 


Large  pub- 
lic invest- 
ments bene- 
ficial to  the 
citizens. 


Individual 
prosperity 
enhanced. 


from  franchises,  concessions,  and  the  direct  public 
management  of  productive  enterprises,  may  reason- 
ably be  expected  in  the  future.  It  would  seem  both 
feasible  and  wise  that  during  the  next  twenty  years 
the  finance  authorities  of  Paris  should  pursue  a  con- 
servative policy,  husbanding  the  public  resources, 
developing  to  the  utmost  the  revenue  from  monopo- 
lies and  concessions,  and  resisting  the  temptation  to 
add  much  to  the  volume  of  bonded  debt.  The  pro- 
posed abolition  of  the  belt  of  fortifications  would  be 
attended  by  a  large  outlay  for  streets,  boulevards, 
and  parkways.  But  it  ought  to  be  possible  to  make 
the  sale  of  private  building-sites  yield  a  fund  large 
enough  to  pay  the  entire  cost  of  the  execution  of  a 
splendid  programme  of  public  works  in  the  zone  now 
occupied  by  the  wall,  moat,  and  glacis. 

To  sum  up  the  financial  position  of  Paris,  it  must 
be  admitted  that  the  per  capita  of  public  debt  is 
large,  and  the  per  capita  of  ordinary  annual  municipal 
expenditure  also  formidable.  Over  against  this  bur- 
den of  expense,  however,  must  be  placed  the  long 
series  of  substantial  benefits  that  the  municipality 
confers  upon  its  citizens.  In  view  of  the  very  high 
average  density  of  the  population,  the  Parisians  are 
peculiarly  dependent  upon  public  services  of  various 
kinds.  The  well-paved  and  well-cleansed  streets  are 
essential  to  comfort  and  health.  Brilliant  public 
illumination,  well-shaded  streets  and  boulevards,  in 
fact,  all  the  agencies  of  civilization  that  the  munici- 
pality supplies,  are  of  the  highest  value  to  the  people. 
If  a  large  percentage  of  the  wealth  of  the  community 
is  absorbed  into  the  public  treasury,  that  wealth  is, 
upon  the  whole,  disbursed  in  such  a  way  as  to  pro- 
duce results  more  valuable  to  society,  and  in  most 
cases  more  valuable  to  the  individuals  concerned, 
than  could  possibly  have  been  secured  by  private  ex- 


PAEIS:   THE  TYPICAL  MODERN  CITY  145 

penditure.  Public  exactions  in  Paris  have  not  tended  CHAP.  i. 
to  exhaust  the  sources  of  private  wealth.  On  the 
contrary,  the  municipal  government  has  been  con- 
spicuously successful  in  fostering  the  industrial  and 
commercial  activities  of  the  Parisian  people,  whose 
prosperity  is  shown  by  their  unfailing  ability  and 
readiness  to  invest  in  municipal  and  other  interest- 
bearing  securities,  no  less  than  by  the  fact  of  a  mil- 
lion individual  savings-bank  accounts  in  a  population 
of  less  than  three  million  souls. 

The  experience  of  Paris,  candidly  studied,  ought  to 
convince  the  most  skeptical  that  there  is  no  modern 
community  of  civilized  men  which  cannot  afford  to 
provide,  for  its  areas  of  dense  population,  the  most  per-  Lessons  from 
feet  public  appointments  that  technical  and  scientific  experience, 
knowledge  have  discovered  and  prescribed.  Well- 
made  and  clean  streets,  good  water,  proper  drainage, 
convenient  transit  facilities,  complete  schools,  thor- 
ough sanitary  organization, — these  at  least  should  be 
considered  the  irreducible  minimum.  No  city  should 
think  itself  rich  enough  to  prosper  without  them, 
and  no  city  is  so  poor  that  it  cannot  afford  them  if 
it  has  any  reason  whatever  for  continued  existence. 
But  further  than  this  indispensable  minimum,  any 
city  might  hopefully  bend  its  energies  toward  the 
acquisition  of  the  finest  flowers  and  fruits  of  culture 
and  art.  Paris  has  exemplified  these  propositions 
with  an  unfaltering  faith  in  science,  in  art,  and  in 
civilization  that  deserves  our  homage. 


10 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM. 

"T/iTTTH  the  great  revolution  of  1789  there  came 

V  T      two  sweeping  changes  in  the  municipal  and 

local  administration  of  France.     One  was  the  estab- 

Theiegisia-    lishment  of  popular  self-government,  or  home-rule. 

of  irs^oo!  The  other  was  the  substitution  of  a  perfectly  regular 
and  uniform  system  for  the  intricate  and  anomalous 
methods  under  which  no  two  communities  could  be 
said  to  possess  identical  institutions.  Every  feature 
of  the  old  organizations  was  effaced  in  order  that  a 
fresh  beginning  might  be  made  upon  logical  prin- 
ciples. The  new  administrative  scheme  created  by  the 
acts  of  the  Constituent  Assembly  in  December,  1789, 
and  January,  1790,  strongly  resembled,  in  its  sim- 
plicity and  its  geometrical  sense  of  relationship  and 
system™  proportion,  the  lucid  and  regular  rules  of  local  govern- 
ment that  the  legislators  of  our  trans-Mississippi 
States  found  it  easy  to  lay  down  where  the  checker- 
board lines  of  the  congressional  land  survey  had  given 
territorial  uniformity  to  school-district,  township  and 
county. 

It  is  true  that  nothing  quite  so  radical  was  at- 
tempted in  France  as  a  territorial  reshaping  on  geo- 

The  forty     metrical  lines  of  the  primary  units  of  administra- 

thousandold       .  ml  .  „        ,  .   ,       . 

communes,  tion.  The  ancient  communes,  of  which  there  were 
nearly  forty  thousand  spread  like  a  network  over  the 
land,  had  to  be  treated  as  permanent  and  irreducible 

146 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


147 


CHAP.  n. 


Permanent 
units. 


° 


political  atoms.  There  was  a  sense  of  distinct  identity 
and  of  immemorial  continuity  in  these  communes,  — 
many  of  which  were  cities,  towns  or  villages,  while 
most  of  them  were  petty  rural  parishes  or  hamlets,  — 
that  withstood  all  shocks  of  revolution.  The  best 
minds  of  the  revolutionary  period  seem  clearly  to 
have  recognized  the  advantages  of  an  autonomous 
neighborhood  life,  and  to  have  considered  the  ancient 
French  commune,  with  its  own  domain  of  lands,  high- 
ways,  and  buildings,  its  local  maintenance  of  order 
and  dispensation  of  petty  justice,  its  administration 
of  relief  and  charity,  and  all  its  microcosmic  life,  as 
the  very  foundation-stone  of  a  true  political  structure. 

But  although  the  old  communes  themselves  were, 
as  a  rule,  left  without  territorial  revision,  the 
larger  administrative  divisions  of  France  were  radi- 
cally altered.  There  had  been  thirty-two  old-time  The  ancient 
provinces,  in  each  of  which  the  royal  authority  had 
been  represented  by  a  functionary  known  as  the  in- 
tendant.  He  in  his  turn  was  represented  in  subdivi- 
sions of  the  province  by  officials  entitled  subdelegues. 
The  provincial  and  local  life  of  France  had  been  sub- 
ject to  the  almost  unlimited  domination  of  these 
agents  of  the  central  authority,  whose  hand  was  at 
once  against  the  nobility  of  the  regions  to  which  they 
were  assigned,  and  against  the  bourgeoisie  that  com- 
posed the  old  municipal  corporations. 

The  lawmakers  of  1789  abolished  at  once  the  prov- 
inces and  the  intendants.  They  reparceled  France 
into  departments,  eighty-nine  in  number,  endeavoring 
to  make  the  departments  as  nearly  equal  in  area  as  cir- 
cumstances  would  permit,  due  account  being  made  of 
population  density,  and  of  the  location  of  chief  towns. 
The  departments  were  subdivided  into  districts,  each 
district  being  composed  of  a  very  large  group  of 
adjacent  communes.  It  was  ordained  that  the  affairs 


partments. 


TtrictsS 


148 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Govern- 
mental 
structure. 


Municipal 
system. 


Classifica- 
tion of  com- 
munes by 
population. 


of  the  department  should  be  managed  by  (1)  a  popu- 
larly elected  Council  General,  composed  of  thirty-six 
members,  whose  functions  were  to  be  deliberative; 
and  (2)  a  group  of  eight  executive  officers,  known  as 
the  Directory,  to  be  designated  by  the  council  gen- 
eral, presumably  out  of  its  own  membership.  The 
districts  were  provided  with  a  government  on  the 
same  plan.  Finally,  the  communes  were  accorded  a 
simple  and  uniform  method  of  self-government.  At 
that  time  the  suffrage  was  not  made  universal,  a  small 
tax  qualification  excluding  the  very  poorest  classes. 

The  qualified  voters  in  every  commune  or  muni- 
cipality, great  or  small,  were  authorized  to  elect  a 
mayor  and  several  other  executive  officers,  these  to- 
gether constituting  what  was  termed  a  corps  muni- 
cipal. A  group  of  men  called  Notables  were  further 
elected  for  the  exercise  of  deliberative  functions. 
These  were  twice  as  many  as  the  executive  officers. 
The  notables  and  the  corps  municipal,  sitting  together 
as  one  body,  formed  the  council  general  of  the  com- 
mune or  municipality,  the  mayor  and  his  executive 
associates  being  in  charge  of  the  active  work  of  ad- 
ministration. The  number  of  officers  varied  in  the 
ratio  of  the  population  of  the  communes,  and  it  was 
thus  intended  by  a  sliding  scale  to  give  the  system 
an  automatic  adjustment  to  the  large  towns  on  the 
one  hand  and  the  small  communes  on  the  other.  For 
communes  having  less  than  five  hundred  people,  of 
which  there  were  a  great  number  in  France,  it  was 
provided  that  there  should  be  three  members  of  the 
corps  municipal,  that  is,  the  mayor  and  two  executive 
associates.  For  more  populous  localities  the  member- 
ship of  the  corps  municipal  was  gradually  augmented 
until  it  reached  the  maximum  number  of  twenty-one 
for  cities  having  a  population  exceeding  one  hundred 
thousand.  All  ordinary  municipal  government  was 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM  149 

carried  on  by  the  corps  municipal,  which  was  further     CHAP.  u. 
divided  into  an  executive  bureau  and  a  council. 

Thus,  in  a  town  having  a  hundred  thousand  people 
or  more,  the  voters  directly  chose  a  mayor  and  twenty  organization 

,1  •    •  <-.•»!         of  a  town  of 

other  members  or  the  municipal  corps,  bix  or  the  one  hundred 
twenty  were  subsequently  designated  by  the  body  it-  peopTe" 
self  as  the  mayor's  assistants  and  coadjutors  in  the 
regular  work  of  executive  administration.  The  other 
fourteen  were  in  regular  and  frequent  consultation 
with  the  seven,  forming  a  governing  council  for  all 
the  ordinary  affairs  of  the  town.  At  longer  intervals 
the  forty-two  elected  notables  were  called  into  session 
with  the  twenty-one,  making  a  body  of  sixty-three 
men,  who  formed  the  council  general  of  the  muni- 
cipality. 

Such  was  the  system  promptly  created  by  the  Con- 
stituent Assembly,  under  the  impulse  of  a  grand  pas- 
sion for  the  principles  of  simplicity  and  uniformity  in 
administration,  and  an  equal  passion  for  local  auton- 
omy and  personal  liberty.  While  it  mavbe  criticized  ideal  rather 

•  J.T-    i  -j.  i         thanprac- 

on  various  accounts,  nevertheless  it  was  a  masterly  ticai. 
piece  of  legislation.  It  was,  perhaps,  too  far  advanced 
for  the  actual  conditions  of  French  life.  However 
that  may  be,  it  was  destined  to  undergo  most  radical 
changes  and  vicissitudes.  Doubtless  its  chief  useful- 
ness lay  in  its  embodiment  of  high  ideals.  It  has 
taken  a  hundred  years  for  the  French  people,  through 
various  political  and  administrative  experiences,  to 
acquire  that  practical  habit  of  local  self-government 
which  the  municipal  laws  of  1790  took  for  granted. 

One  of  the  most  serious  faults  of  this  legislation 
was  its  failure  to  discriminate  wisely  between  urban 
and  rural  units  of  local  government.    Except  that  the 
number  of  officers  was  smaller  in  the  communes  of  tooeiliSorate 
sparse  population,  the  exact  scheme  of  organization      towns. 
that  was  provided  for  cities  and  large  towns  was  also 
10* 


150 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Permanent 
results  of 
the  legisla- 
tion of  1790. 


The  hard 
lesson  of 
local  self- 
government. 


made  applicable  to  all  local  units  down  to  the  popula- 
tion line  of  five  hundred.  The  communes  of  less  than 
five  hundred  people  were  of  simpler  organization.  But 
there  were  thousands  of  local-government  units  in 
France  possessing  a  population  of  more  than  five 
hundred  and  less  than  five  thousand,  for  which  the 
law  of  1789-90  provided  a  cumbrous  and  over-elabo- 
rate system  of  administration.  The  French  laws  from 
that  time  until  now  have  never  made  quite  enough 
difference  between  the  government  of  urban  and  rural 
communities,  although  the  distinctions  have  become 
better  marked. 

From  that  period  of  lawmaking  there  has  survived 
the  series  of  departments,  which  have  become  crystal- 
lized into  entities  as  distinct  and  real  as  the  great 
English  counties,  while  very  much  more  uniform  in 
size  and  population.  Moreover,  throughout  the  entire 
administrative  system  of  France,  there  has  remained, 
despite  all  changes  of  method  and  of  spirit,  an  un- 
wavering devotion  to  the  principle  of  system  and 
uniformity.  I  have  said  that  the  laws  of  the  Con- 
stituent Assembly  exemplified  the  two  great  ideas, 
first,  of  simplicity  and  uniformity  in  the  structure  of 
municipal  and  local  government ;  and  second,  of  popu- 
lar home  rule  on  the  elective  basis.  It  is  this  prin- 
ciple of  decentralization  and  local  self-responsibility 
that  has  been  the  hard  lesson  for  the  French  nation 
to  master.  They  have  not  perfectly  learned  it  yet, 
although  the  experience  of  a  hundred  years  has  begun 
to  give  them  confidence  in  the  principle,  and  a  con- 
siderable measure  of  ability  in  applying  it. 

In  1795,  France  having  come  under  the  government 
of  the  Directory,  a  new  administrative  system  was 
devised  which  possessed  some  merits  and  many  de- 
fects. This  new  legislation  is  always  cited  as  the 
Constitution  du  5  Fructidor,  de  Van  III.  (August  22, 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  151 

1795).    In  the  departments  the  elective  councils  were     CHAP.  n. 
abolished,  and  all  functions,  both  of  deliberation  and 
of  action,  were  merged  in  a  departmental  Directory    Sy^new 
of  five  members.     These  directors  were  elected  one  8ystem>1795- 
each  year  for  five-year  terms  by  all  the  qualified  vot- 
ers of  the  department.      The  central   Directory  of 
the  Republic,  meanwhile,  retained  the  right  to  depose 
the  departmental  directors  and  to  appoint  substitutes. 
Under  the  system  of  1790,  besides  the  officers  whom  I 
have  already  mentioned,  the  people  of  the  department 
were  empowered  to  elect  a  so-called  Syndic  Procureur, 
who  had  a  voice  but  not  a  vote  in  the  departmental 
council,  and  who  was  the  department's  agent  and  rep- 
resentative in  various  legal  and  other  relationships. 
This  popularly  elected  officer  was  now  replaced  in  the 
Directory's  system  by  a  so-called  Commissaire,  who 
was  appointed  by  the   national   government    from     Tendency 
among  the  citizens  domiciled  in  the  department,  and  ^ranaition! 
whose  business  it  was  to  oversee  the  execution  of  the 
national  laws  within  his  territory.     Thus,  while  the 
government  of  the  department  still  remained  largely 
local  and  representative,  it  will  be  readily  seen  that 
the  strong  tendency  of  the  system  of  1795  was  toward 
centralization. 

In  place  of  the  districts  which  the  laws  of  1789  had 
created  as  intermediary  between  the  departments  and 
the  communes,  and  which  had  possessed  only  a  limited 
importance,  the  Directory  now  substituted  a  much  creation  of 
smaller  series  of  territorial  divisions  entitled  cantons.  thtousC."n~ 
The  cantons  were  given  an  incomparably  greater  im- 
portance than  the  districts  which  they  replaced.  The 
canton  comprised  an  average  of  about  twelve  com- 
munes, while  the  district  included  perhaps  a  hundred. 
The  function  of  the  canton  in  the  rural  regions  may 
readily  be  explained.  It  was  intended  to  remedy  the 
serious  mistake  in  the  earlier  laws  of  attempting  to 


152  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.     impose  an   elaborate    municipal    government  upon 
simple  agricultural  neighborhoods.     The  full  muni- 

Their  place  cipal  organization  was  now  abolished  in  communes  of 
in  rural  life,  less  than  five  thousand  inhabitants.  Each  commune 
of  less  than  this  number  of  people  was  authorized  to 
elect  from  among  its  own  citizens  a  municipal  agent 
and  one  adjunct  or  assistant.  All  active  administra- 
tion in  the  commune  was  confided  to  these  two  officials. 
But  it  was  the  canton,  under  this  regime,  which  be- 
came the  real  unit  of  government.  There  was  estab- 
lished what  was  known  as  an  administration  municipal 
du  canton,  which  was  composed  of  the  agents  of  the 
several  communes  constituting  the  cantonal  circum- 
scription, together  with  a  President  elected  by  direct 
vote  of  the  qualified  electors  of  the  canton.  All  de- 
liberative functions  were  intrusted  to  this  body. 

The  commune  had  therefore  lost  much  of  its -inde- 
pendence, and  had  in  effect  become  hardly  anything 
more  than  an  administrative  division  of  the  canton. 
Something  very  similar  has  taken  place  in  several  of 
our  American  States,  where  the  county  government 
has  gained  authority  at  the  expense  of  the  township 
government.  Thus  the  cantonal  administration  of 
1795  might  be  considered  as  reproduced  in  a  western 
county  where  each  township  elected  a  supervisor  or 
trustee  for  the  administration  of  its  ordinary  affairs, 
and  where  these  township  supervisors,  coming  to- 
gether in  session  at  the  county-seat,  constituted  a 
board  of  supervisors  for  the  county,  under  the  chair- 
manship of  a  president  of  the  board  elected  directly 
by  all  the  voters  of  the  county. 

This  system  was  not  wholly  bad  for  the  rural  parts 
of  France.    But  the  Directory,  with  the  French  pas- 
sion for  logic  and  symmetry,  undertook  to  assimilate 
cantons?    the  large  towns  to  the  cantonal  unit.    Each  commune 
or  municipality  having  from  five  thousand  to  one  hun- 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  153 

dred  thousand  people  was  made  a  distinct  cantonal  CHAP.  n. 
entity,  with  an  administration  of  its  own  composed 
of  from  five  to  nine  members,  according  to  the  size  of 
the  town  or  city.  These  officials  were  elected  by  the 
voters  of  the  town,  and  constituted  what  might  be 
called  a  board  of  municipal  trustees  or  directors,  in 
whose  hands  was  reposed  the  exercise  of  all  municipal 
functions,  whether  deliberative  or  executive.  The  sys- 
tem was  by  no  means  an  absurd  one ;  and  in  view  of 
the  actual  conditions  of  local  life  prevailing  in  France 
at  that  time,  it  may  have  been  better  than  the  system 
of  1789. 

When  the  large  towns  having  more  than  a  hundred 
thousand  people  had  to  be  dealt  with,  it  was  deter- 
mined to  try  the  plan  of  subdividing  them  into  can- 
tons, each  of  which  should  have  its  own  board  of  large  towns, 
directors.  Thus,  Paris  was  partitioned  into  twelve 
municipality  canfonales,  while  Marseilles  and  Lyons 
—  the  only  other  towns  which  at  that  time  possessed 
more  than  a  hundred  thousand  inhabitants  —  were 
each  cut  into  three  such  administrative  districts.  The 
voters  in  each  of  these  urban  cantons  elected  a  di- 
rectory of  seven  members,  charged  with  all  the  duties 

J  Cantonal 

of  current  administration.     In  order,  however,  to  pro-    directories 

7  •*•  and  central 

vide  for  certain  administrative  municipal  tasks  which  bureaus. 
could  not  be  apportioned  to  these  arbitrary  divisions, 
some  sort  of  central  bureau  was  requisite;  and  the 
Directory  of  the  Republic  retained  in  its  own  hands 
the  designation  of  the  members  of  the  central  bureau 
for  Paris,  while  for  the  other  two  large  towns  the 
three  members  of  the  central  municipal  bureau  were 
designated  by  the  departmental  directory,  subject  to 
confirmation  by  the  national  government. 

It  should  be  noted  that  these  cantonal  administra- 
tions were  subordinated  in  the  exercise  of  their  au- 
thority to  the  departmental  administrations.  Thus, 


154 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  ii. 


subjection 

of  cantons  to 

departments, 


summary 

estimate  of 

the  system, 


Napoleon's 

system  of 

1800. 


Entrance  of 

the  prefect, 


the  government  of  the  department  had  a  right  to  nul- 
lify the  acts  of  the  cantons  and  municipalities,  and 
also  under  certain  circumstances  to  suspend  the  can- 
tonal and  municipal  officers.  But  such  suspension 
was  in  turn  subject  to  the  approval  or  disapproval  of 
the  central  government  at  Paris.  This  possibility  of 
interference  by  the  higher  authorities  constituted  a 
serious  limitation  upon  the  regime  of  local  indepen- 
dence which  had  been  ordained  five  years  earlier. 

Let  this  suffice  for  a  rapid  outlining  of  the  admin- 
istrative system  of  1795.  One  is  at  a  loss  to  describe 
it  in  such  a  manner  as  to  make  it  seem  an  actual  ar- 
rangement and  to  relieve  it  from  the  appearance  of 
being  altogether  artificial  and  forced.  It  certainly 
was  surcharged  with  the  experimenting  audacity  of 
the  times  which  gave  it  birth.  Nevertheless  it  evinces 
some  true  elements  of  constructive  statesmanship. 
Chiefly,  however,  it  serves  to  betray  the  exigencies  of 
a  situation  in  the  sphere  of  the  higher  politics  which 
compelled  the  transient  possessors  of  power  to  tighten 
their  grasp  and  to  strengthen  the  lines  of  central 
authority. 

It  remained  for  the  legislation  of  the  year  1800,  in- 
spired by  Napoleon  as  Premier  Consul,  to  complete 
the  work  of  centralization.  The  principle  of  unity 
and  symmetry  was  retained  in  all  perfection,  but  the 
principle  of  local  self-government  was  absolutely  re- 
jected. The  departmental  commissaire,  who  had  been 
selected  by  the  Directory  from  among  the  citizens  of 
the  department,  and  who  had  been  charged  with  the 
duty  of  seeing  that  the  public  laws  were  enforced, 
was  transmuted  by  Napoleon  into  the  Prefect  of  the 
department.  The  prefect  was  not  only  charged  with 
seeing  that  the  laws  were  enforced,  but  he  was  made 
the  sole  executive  and  administrative  authority  in  the 
department.  He  was  appointed  for  each  department 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  155 

by  the  central  authority,  that  is  to  say,  by  Napoleon     CHAP.  n. 
himself.     The  departmental  Council  General  was  re- 
tained as  a  matter  of  form,  but  its  elective  character 
had  disappeared.     It  was  now  a  mere  body  of  ap-  councils  be- 

•*•  .  *  come  ap- 

pointed advisers,  varying  m  number  from  sixteen  to     poiutive. 

twenty-four,  all  of  whom  were  designated  by  the  Pre- 
mier Consul  himself,  acting  of  course  very  largely  up- 
on the  suggestions  of  his  trusted  prefect.  There  was 
also  appointed  by  the  central  authority  a  so-called 
Council  of  Prefecture,  consisting  of  from  three  to  five 
members,  its  business  being  to  deal  judicially  with 
administrative  disputes  and  contentions  arising  in  the 
government  of  the  department  or  of  any  of  its  minor 
divisions. 

The  prefect  was,  in  point  of  fact,  the  virtual  resurrec- 
tion of  the  intendant  of  the  ancien  regime.  He  was  the 
personal  agent  of  the  central  authority,  was  a  stranger  Historical 

t       ,,         ..    £  ,  .    ,      ,  ,      .    J.  '  ,  *         character  of 

in  the  department  which  he  administered,  and  be-  the  prefect. 
longed  to  the  type  of  nomadic  administrative  function- 
ary whose  prototype  is  found  in  the  Roman  proconsul, 
and  whose  race  has  perhaps  never  been  extinct  in 
France  from  the  time  of  the  conquest  of  Gaul  to  the 
present  day.  Descending  one  step  from  the  depart- 
ment and  its  prefectoral  administration,  we  find  the 
old  district,  practically  as  created  in  1789,  now  recon- 
stituted under  the  name  of  the  arrondissement.  This 
division,  as  I  have  explained,  had  been  abandoned 
by  the  law  of  1795  in  favor  of  the  much  smaller  Appearance 

,.    .    .  ,,     ,     ,,  .  ,      .     .    ,       ..          ofthearron- 

division  called  the    canton.    As    an   administrative    dissement. 
division  the  canton  now  practically  disappeared,  al- 
though retained  as  a  judicial  district  and  for  certain 
other  purposes.   In  the  arrondissement  there  made  ap- 
pearance the  sub-prefect,  who  is  altogether  analogous  to 
the  sub-delegate  of  the  ancien  regime,  just  as  the  pre- 
fect of  the  department  suggests  the  old-time  intendant      prefect 
of  the  province.     The  Napoleonic  sub-prefect  was  the 


156 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


The  limited 

nature  of  the 

arrondisse- 

inents. 


All  munici- 
pal officers 
appointed. 


Extent  of 
the  Premier 

Consul's 
patronage. 


appointee  of  the  higher  authorities,  was  the  agent  of 
the  prefect,  and  had  the  assistance  of  an  arrondisse- 
ment  council  of  ten  or  twelve  members  whose  func- 
tions were  advisory,  and  who  held  their  positions  by 
virtue  of  appointment  by  the  central  authority.  The 
arrondissement  was  not  a  complete  and  distinct  legal 
personality  like  the  department  on  the  one  hand  or 
the  municipality  or  commune  on  the  other,  but  a  mere 
division  for  administrative  convenience,  existing  for 
comparatively  limited  purposes,  holding  no  property 
in  its  own  name  or  right,  and  having  none  of  the  at- 
tributes of  a  body  politic  and  corporate. 

As  for  the  communes  under  the  legislation  of  the 
year  1800  (which  is  always  cited  as  the  law  of  28 
Pluviose,  an  VIII.),  we  find  that  they  were  still  ac- 
corded, as  in  the  law  of  1789,  a  mayor  with  several 
adjuncts  or  assistant  executive  officers  and  delibera- 
tive councils.  But  whereas  these  were  all  elected  by 
the  people  of  the  commune  under  the  earlier  legisla- 
tion, they  had  all,  by  the  fundamental  law  of  the  year 
1800,  become  appointive  functionaries,  owing  their 
places  to  the  central  executive  authority.  Of  course 
Napoleon  could  not  in  his  own  person  make  selection 
of  mayors,  executive  adjuncts,  municipal  councilors, 
arrondissement  councilors,  and  departmental  coun- 
cilors, for  the  whole  of  France,  inasmuch  as  this 
would  have  involved  the  naming  of  half  a  million 
functionaries.  But  where  he  did  not  make  personal 
selections,  the  choice  was  exercised  for  him  by  his 
prefects  or  sub-prefects. 

In  practice,  the  Premier  Consul  was  supposed  to 
appoint  the  mayors  and  councils  of  cities  and  towns 
having  more  than  five  thousand  people ;  while  the  de- 
partmental prefects  were  authorized  to  make  appoint- 
ments in  the  smaller  communes.  The  only  limitation 
upon  this  exercise  of  absolute  central  power  was  the 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  157 

requirement  that  mayors  and  municipal  councilors  CHAP.  IL 
must  be  chosen  from  certain  lists  of  their  fellow-cit- 
izens which  the  electors  had  some  voice  in  preparing. 
This  limitation  in  practice  did  not  act  as  an  impor- 
tant  restraint.  Two  or  three  years  later,  under  some 
circumstances,  it  was  permitted  to  the  electors  of 
municipalities  to  nominate  two  candidates  for  every 
place  which  became  vacant,  one  of  whom  should  be 
appointed  by  the  superior  authority;  but  even  this 
concession  was  not  allowed  to  become  operative  as  an 
ordinary  rule. 

This  arbitrary  system  of  municipal  subjection  was 
not  abandoned,  as  it  ought  to  have  been,  upon  the 
downfall  of  Napoleon's  empire.  It  held  its  own  with- 
out  material  modification  at  any  point  under  the  Restoration! 
period  of  the  Restoration  up  to  the  revolution  of  1830, 
when  France  again  became  a  republic  except  in  name, 
—  Louis  Philippe's  being  "  a  throne  surrounded  by 
republican  institutions."  There  had  been  able  states- 
men in  the  epoch  of  the  Restoration  who  had  de- 
manded a  return  to  the  plan  of  popularly  elected 
municipal  councils,  but  in  vain.  This  reform  was 
promptly  granted  by  the  government  of  1830. 

The  act  of  March,  1831,  allowed  a  list  of  municipal 
voters  possessing  a  modest  property  qualification  to 

,  r,  „    , ,  .    .       ,  M        mu         Municipal 

choose  the  members  or  the  municipal  council.  The  councils  be- 
central  government  retained  the  right  to  appoint  the 
mayors  and  their  adjuncts  or  executive  assistants; 
but  in  making  these  appointments  the  minister  of  the 
interior  was  obliged  to  confine  his  selections  wholly 
to  the  elected  members  of  the  council.  Herein  lay  a 
very  substantial  concession  to  the  principle  of  local 
self-government.  The  councils  remained,  however, 
very  much  under  the  tutelage  of  the  prefect,  who  con- 
tinued to  administer  the  department  as  the  direct 
representative  of  the  central  authorities. 


158 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


OComy.  n 


CHAP.  IL  Through  all  these  vicissitudes,  it  should  be  ob- 
served, municipal  affairs  were  actively  administered 
by  mayors  and  adjuncts,  with  the  assistance  in  delib- 
erative affairs  of  a  municipal  council.  The  principal 

All  fluctu-  .  r  r 

ations  af-  changes  f  rom  time  to  time  concerned  themselves  al- 
most  wholly  with  the  question  whether  these  local 
officers  should  derive  their  places  and  authority  pri- 
marily from  the  commune  itself  or  from  the  higher 
government.  The  revolution  of  1848  carried  the 
emancipation  of  municipalities  much  further  than  that 
of  1830.  Universal  suffrage  now  replaced  the  limited 
suffrage  which  had  held  sway  for  nearly  twenty  years  ; 
while  for  towns  of  six  thousand  people  or  less  the 
municipal  councils  were  permitted  to  select  the  mayor 
and  other  executive  officers  from  their  own  member- 
ship, without  interference  from  any  superior  admin- 
istration. As  for  the  towns  of  greater  population,  the 
central  government  of  the  Republic  thought  it  neces- 
sary to  retain  the  right  to  designate  the  executive  of- 
ficers, although  appointments  were  always  made  from 
among  the  elected  members  of  the  municipal  councils. 
The  spirit  of  the  legislation  of  1848  was  that  of  confi- 
dence in  the  principle  of  municipal  home-rule. 

With  the  public  events  which  in  1852  made  Louis 
Napoleon  Emperor  of  the  French,  there  began  another 
epoch  in  the  administrative  life  of  the  French  munici- 
palities.  The  prefectoral  system  was  reinvigorated, 
'  and  the  mayors  and  executive  officers  of  all  munici- 
palities and  communes  became,  like  the  sub-prefects, 
a  part  of  the  administrative  mechanism  of  a  system 
of  autocratic,  centralized  government.  The  munici- 
pal councils  retained  their  elective  character,  but  the 
mayors  and  adjuncts  of  all  communes,  from  the  great 
towns  to  the  smallest  country  hamlet,  were  named  by 
the  Emperor  or  by  the  prefects  acting  for  him,  and  the 
choice  was  not  limited  to  the  membership  of  the  councils. 


e 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  159 

The  municipal  system  retained  these  essential  char-  CHAP.  n. 
acteristics  throughout  the  period  of  the  Second  Em- 
pire. I  have  shown  in  the  preceding  chapter  with 
what  scope  and  magnificence  the  work  of  modernizing 
the  capital  city  was  prosecuted  during  this  epoch; 
and  it  is  true  of  other  French  cities  and  towns  that 
the  spirit  of  the  new  Paris  was  to  some  extent  reflected 
in  their  municipal  activities.  For  Baron  Haussmann, 
as  prefect  of  the  Seine,  was  only  one  of  Napoleon 
III.  's  energetic  agents.  It  must  be  remembered  that 

.  . °  Character  of 

through  this  period  the  initiative  in  local  and  muni-  the  period. 
cipal  life  belonged  chiefly  to  the  appointed  execu- 
tive officers.  The  elected  councils  were  expected  to 
approve  the  projects  recommended  by  the  executive 
authority,  and  to  duly  sanction  by  their  votes  the 
financial  estimates  and  budgets  that  were  submitted 
for  their  formal  acceptance.  The  councils,  it  is  true, 
possessed  some  measure  of  substantial  influence  and 
authority;  but  the  imperial  will,  which  made  itself 
felt  so  directly  and  powerfully  in  the  affairs  of  Paris, 
was  not  without  its  high  degree  of  potency  also  in 
Lyons,  Marseilles,  and  every  other  considerable  town 
of  France.  Inasmuch  as  this  influence  was,  in  the 
main,  exerted  in  behalf  of  municipal  progress,  as  I  Napoieonin. 
have  endeavored  to  make  clear  in  my  description  of 
the  Napoleon-Haussmann  epoch  in  the  transformation 
of  Paris,  it  cannot  be  said  that  the  Second  Empire 
forms  a  barren  or  reactionary  period  in  the  material 
and  visible  progress  of  the  chief  communities  of 
France.  But  it  was  certainly  a  period  in  which  the 
principle  of  self-government  was  repressed  and  dis- 
couraged ;  and  its  educative  effect  upon  the  citizenship 
of  the  nation  cannot  be  considered  beneficial. 

There  are  several  reasons  why  the  legislation  of 
1871,  immediately  following  the  overthrow  of  the  Em- 
pire and  ushering  in  the  happier  and  better  epoch  of 


160  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.  the  Third  Republic,  did  not  revert  with  confidence  to 
the  salutary  principles  of  the  municipal  legislation  of 
the  two  preceding  republican  periods.  The  immedi- 
ate reason  undoubtedly  was  the  position  of  M.  Thiers. 
This  eminent  statesman  felt  himself  responsible  for 
the  political  situation  of  the  nation  as  a  whole,  at  a 
conserva-  time  when  the  communal  uprising  in  Paris  had  caused 
<ieSi™  Thiers!  many  conservative  men  to  doubt  the  advantages  of 
municipal  autonomy,  while  also  it  was  declared  that  a 
large  concession  of  local  self-government  would  aid 
the  schemes,  in  various  parts  of  France,  of  the  mon- 
archist factions,  which  were  formidably  plotting 
against  the  republic. 

In  short,  it  was  a  moment  of  peculiar  political  strain 
and  exigency;  and  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that 
President  Thiers,  who  had  grown  old  in  the  traditions 
of  the  system  of  high  centralization,  should  have 
lacked  the  courage  to  try  the  experiment  of  allowing 
the  people  of  the  French  towns  to  manage  their  own 
affairs  in  their  own  way.  The  National  Assembly  at 
first  voted  to  allow  all  municipal  councils  to  choose 
the  mayors  and  executive  adjuncts.  Then  M.  Thiers 
protested  and  threatened  to  resign  unless  the  vote 
were  rescinded;  and  his  wishes  were  obeyed.  Ac- 


cordingly, the  higher  authorities  retained  the  right  to 
appoint  the  mayors  of  towns  having  twenty  thousand 
people  or  more,  while  for  the  smaller  places  the 
councils  were  allowed  to  designate  the  mayor  and 
adjuncts. 

Municipal  councils  had  been  appointed  for  seven- 

year  terms  under  the  Second  Empire,  and  the  mayors 

for  terms  of  five  years.      The  National  Assembly  of 

Terms  of     1871  reduced  the  terms  of  councilors  and  mayors 

municipal         ,..  ,,  0  ,  „ 

officers,  alike  to  three  years.  Several  concessions  of  some  in- 
cidental importance  to  the  principle  of  local  self-gov- 
ernment were  adopted,  and  it  is  certainly  important 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  161 

to  bear  in  mind  the  spirit  of  the  National  Assembly,     CHAP.  IL 
which  was  distinctly  friendly  to  the  idea  of  decentral- 
ization, radical  changes  in  the  system  of  local  govern-  spirit  of  the 

.  ,    ,  i  National 

ment  being  regarded  as  merely  postponed  because  Assembly. 
some  of  the  leading  spirits  in  national  affairs  did  not 
deem  it  safe  for  the  moment  to  relinquish  the  repub- 
lic's firm  central  hold  on  local  administration  so  long 
as  there  was  menace  from  foreign  complications 
without  or  from  royalist  factions  within. 

The  experience  of  immediately  following  years 
abundantly  proved  this  conservative  timidity  to  have 
been  ill  founded.  Central  domination  in  purely  lo- 
cal affairs  is  incompatible  with  a  republican  form  of 

r  .     r  Centrahza- 

government.     Under  the  autocratic  system  of  Napo-  tion  imprac- 

0  ticableunder 

leon  III.,  there  was  the  substance  of  power  as  well  as  a  republic, 
the  form  in  the  system  of  centralization.  But  when 
the  Third  Republic  was  fairly  launched  upon  its 
course,  the  spirit  of  self-government  grew  constantly 
stronger  in  the  towns  and  cities ;  and  the  central  au- 
thorities of  the  republic,  obliged  to  rely  upon  the  sup- 
port of  public  opinion  rather  than  upon  military 
power,  did  not  find  it  politic  very  often  to  thwart 
the  will  of  a  community  by  appointing  an  unpopular 
mayor.  As  a  natural  consequence,  in  those  early 
years  of  the  republic,  the  municipal  councils  (elected 
almost  universally  upon  the  lines  of  national  party  Municipal 
or  faction),  boldly  proceeded  to  designate  their  own  tion. 
mayors  and  adjuncts,  and  the  higher  authorities 
tamely  ratified  the  local  choice.  In  some  cases  the 
councils  went  so  far  as  to  install  their  mayors  without 
waiting  for  the  ratification  of  the  President  of  the 
republic. 

Under  the  Napoleonic  system  the  municipal  gov- 
ernments were  obliged  to  submit  every  act  of  any 
importance  to  the  prefectoral  or  national  authorities    domination 
for  their  assent.    Mayors  and  councils  were  subject  °  eminent 
11 


162 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  ii.  to  suspension  at  any  time  by  the  prefect,  and  to  dis- 
solution by  order  of  the  central  government  at  Paris. 
All  this  exercise  of  tutelage  was,  moreover,  an  active 
and  constant  domination,  rather  than  a  formal  and 
passive  acquiescence  or  an  occasional  check.  But 
while  under  the  republic  there  still  survived  in  law 
this  subjection  of  municipal  budgets,  ordinances,  con- 
tracts, and  all  other  matters  deliberative  or  executive, 
to  the  central  government  or  its  prefectoral  agents, 

Different     a  different  spirit  became  manifest.    The  municipal 

spirit  under  ^       . 

the  republic,  councils  and  their  executive  officers  grew  more  asser- 
tive, while  the  prefects  and  the  central  government 
became  correspondingly  more  compliant.  The  prin- 
ciple of  self-government  was  no  longer  set  at  defiance ; 
and  the  supervision  of  municipal  officers  by  the  supe- 
rior officials  tended  more  and  more  to  limit  itself  to 
a  reasonable  protection  of  the  municipalities  them- 
selves against  bad  financiering,  or  against  some  way- 
ward or  exceptional  act  of  policy. 

Although  the  republican  lawmakers  of  1871  ab- 
stained from  any  radical  revision  of  the  system  of 
municipal  government  prevailing  throughout  France, 
they  allowed  themselves  at  least  to  deal  broadly  and 
wisely  with  the  administrative  system  of  the  depart- 
ments. The  loss  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine  had  reduced 
the  eighty-nine  departments  to  eighty-seven.  All  ex- 
isting laws  affecting  the  departments  in  any  wise 
were  thoroughly  revised  and  recast,  so  that  there 
emerged  one  elaborate  and  well-codified  act.  The 
popularly  elected  Council  General  of  the  department 
was  accorded  a  much  increased  measure  of  authority, 
and  it  was  permitted  to  designate  out  of  its  own  mem- 
bership a  standing  executive  commission  which  should 
be  on  constant  duty,  and  should  take  in  hand  some  of 
the  most  important  functions  that  had  previously  de- 
volved upon  the  appointed  prefect.  This  depart- 


Departmen- 
tal  reform. 


Legislation 
of  1871. 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  163 

mental  legislation  formed  a  large  step  in  the  direction     CHAP.  n. 
of  true  constitutional  reform,  and  its  wisdom  has  been 
justified  by  the  experience  of  more  than  a  quarter 
of  a  century. 

It  was  perhaps  quite  as  well  that  the  Assembly  of 
1871  should  have  paused  where  it  did.  All  that  was 
needed  was  a  few  years  of  the  practical  working  of  n 

•_   _  r  Experience 

the  new  departmental  laws,  and  some  experience  of  as  a  guide, 
the  futility  of  attempting  to  hold  municipal  adminis- 
tration under  the  close  tutelage  of  a  central  republi- 
can government,  in  order  to  make  it  easy  enough,  in 
the  fullness  of  time,  to  agree  upon  a  reform  of  the 
municipal  and  communal  system. 

The  present  municipal  system  of  France  was  framed 
in  the  act  which  bears  the  date  of  April  5, 1884.  The 
laws  that  prescribed  the  system  then  found  surviving  Great  muni- 
were  scattered  through  the  statute-books  of  ninety-  Clpai884.e° 
five  years ;  for  there  still  remained  in  force  some  sec- 
tions of  the  acts  of  1789  and  1790,  while  parts  of  the 
enactments  and  decrees  of  every  subsequent  period 
had  been  kept  alive.  In  1884,  however,  every  vestige 
of  earlier  legislation  was  repealed  in  order  that  one 
complete  statute  might  serve  as  a  municipal  code,  em- 
bodying every  necessary  legal  provision  for  the  or- 
ganization and  government  of  the  communes. 

This  piece  of  legislation  is  analogous  to  the  English 
municipal  code  of  1882,  which  consolidated  the  nu- 
merous enactments  of  the  period  following  the  great  compared 
municipal  reform  bill  of  1835,  and  which  has  given  iSh  code. 
the  British  municipal  corporations  so  admirable  a 
framework.  Several  distinguished  French  publicists — 
among  them  M.  Paul  Leroy-Beaulieu  —  had  long  held 
up  the  English  municipal  system  as  the  one  great  and 
admirable  model  toward  the  principles  of  which  they 
urged  their  fellow-countrymen  to  advance  in  reform- 
ing the  French  system.  Unquestionably  the  health- 


164  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.  ful  and  prosperous  municipal  life  of  the  British  towns 
under  the  popular  self-government  guaranteed  to 
them  by  the  reform  legislation  of  a  half -century  pre- 
vious, and  further  confirmed  by  the  code  of  1882,  had 
its  due  influence  upon  the  minds  of  the  French  states- 
men who  devised  the  excellent  statute  of  April,  1884. 
The  English  system,  as  I  have  elsewhere  shown, 
concerns  itself  only  with  those  urban  entities  which 
have  secured  recognition  under  the  law  as  municipal 
corporations.  It  has  been  reserved  for  the  legislation 
of  1894.  of  1894,  in  the  Local  Government  Bill,  to  provide  the 
civil  parishes — that  is  to  say,  the  fifteen  thousand 
minor  administrative  areas  of  England  and  Wales  — 
with  a  system  of  local  self-government,  under  elective 
councils,  analogous  to  that  which  the  municipal  cor- 
porations have  so  long  enjoyed.  Under  the  French 
.,  ,  system  each  unit  of  local  administration,  whether 

French  code      J 

of  1884  cor-    great  or  small,  is  known  as  a  commune,  and  each  has 

responds  to     "  .  . 

English  acts  its  so-called  municipal  organization.     The  one  statute 

of  1882  and  r  ° 

1894.  of  1884  deals  with  them  all,  adapting  itself  to  their 
differences  of  size  by  classifying  them  according  to 
population.  The  British  Local  Government  Act  of 
1888,  which  established  county  councils  on  the  elective 
plan,  and  completely  reconstructed  the  government  of 
these  larger  divisions  of  the  country,  may  be  regarded 
cou^tfe^and  as  comparable  with  the  French  legislation  of  1871, 
which  reformed  the  administrative  system  of  the 
departments.  Thus,  the  English  began  their  local 
ministrative  reforms  with  the  principal  towns, 
adopting  for  them,  by  the  municipal  act  of  1835,  a 
uniform  system  on  the  basis  of  popular  self-govern- 
ment. In  1888  they  applied  an  analogous  system  to 
the  government  of  the  counties,  and  in  1894  they 
erected  a  system  of  parish  government  upon  the  same 
principles.  Viewing  the  French  system  as  it  now 
stands,  the  departmental  reform  dates  from  1871, 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  165 

thus  preceding  the  reform  of  the  English  counties  by  CHAP.  n. 
seventeen  years ;  while  the  thousands  of  country  dis- 
tricts or  communes,  analogous  to  the  English  parishes, 
were  all  comprised  in  the  municipal  legislation  of 
1884.  Throughout  the  French  system  there  is  the 
unity  and  harmony  of  an  elaborate  piece  of  architec-  The  two  sys- 

.  ,          ,  .  terns  con- 

ture  made  fit  for  its  purpose  by  skilful  and  artistic  trasted. 
hands.  The  English  system,  on  the  other  hand,  seems 
more  to  resemble  a  sturdy  tree  with  firm,  deep  roots 
and  massive  trunk,  and  with  spreading  boughs  which 
maintain  a  general  symmetry  and  balance  without 
semblance  of  precise  regularity. 

The  sacrifice  of  territory  as  a  result  of  the  war  with 
Germany  cost  France  nearly  2000  communes;  but 
there  remained  approximately  36,000,  which  number 
in  1895  had  increased  to  36,140,  through  rearrange- 
ments of  boundary  resulting  from  growth  and 
change.1  The  law  of  1884  contains  168  articles,  the  T 

0  Present  gov- 

first  of  which  is  as  follows :  "  The  municipal  corps  of    ernment  of 
each  commune  shall  be  composed  of  the  municipal      munes. 
council,  the  mayor,  and  one  or  more  adjuncts."    For- 
mer legislation  had  designated  the  mayor  and  his  ex- 
ecutive assistants  first,  and  the  municipal  council 
afterward.     It  was  by  intention,  and  not  by  accident, 
that  the  order  was  reversed  in  the  new  law.     The 
Minister  of  the  Interior,  in  a  circular  addressed  to  the 
prefects  of  all  the  departments,  dated  May  15,  1884, — 
his  letter  being  an  elaborate  running  commentary  upon    Municipal 
the  provisions  of  the  new  municipal  act, —  remarked    chfeffeet 
that  this  first   article  was  a  "reproduction  of  the 
opening  paragraph  of  the  law  of  May  5, 1855,  with  this 
exception :   that  in  the  enumeration  of  the  members 
of  the  municipal  corps,  the  first  place  is  now  assigned 

1  It  may  be  well  to  observe  at  this  point  that  the  87  depart- 
ments of  France  are  (in  1895)  subdivided  into  362  arrondisse- 
ments,  2871  cantons,  and  36,140  communes. 
11* 


166 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  ii.  to  the  municipal  council.  It  is  necessary,"  he  con- 
tinued, "to  recognize  the  fact  that  by  this  change 
homage  is  meant  to  be  paid  to  the  direct  representa- 
tives of  universal  suffrage,  from  whom  the  mayor 
himself  derives  his  powers." 

For  communes  having  500  inhabitants  or  less  the 
municipal  council  consists  of  ten  members.  There 
are  more  than  seventeen  thousand, —  nearly  one  half 
of  the  total  number  of  French  communes, —  belong- 
of1counciip  ing  to  this  class.  More  than  fourteen  thousand 
Copulation,  have  between  500  and  1500  people,  and  for  each  of 
these  the  number  of  councilors  is  twelve.  The  next 
class  embraces  communes  of  less  than  2500  people, 
to  which  sixteen  councilors  are  allowed.  Twenty-one 
members  belong  to  the  councils  of  towns  having  from 
2500  to  3500  people,  and  twenty-three  councilors  to 
those  having  more  than  3500  and  less  than  10,000. 
Twenty-seven  councilors  are  chosen  by  communes 
having  from  10,000  to  30,000 ;  thirty  by  those  having 
from  30,000  to  40,000 ;  thirty-two  by  those  having  from 
40,000  to  50,000;  thirty-four  by  those  having  from 
50,000  to  60,000 ;  and  thirty-six  belong  to  those  with 
a  population  exceeding  60,000,  excepting  Lyons  and 
Paris.  By  a  special  arrangement  the  council  of 
Lyons  contains  fifty-four  members,  and  that  of  Paris 
eighty. 

As  a  general  rule,  the  act  ordains  that "  the  election 
of  the  members  of  the  municipal  council  shall  take 
place  for  every  commune  au  scrutin  de  liste"  —  that 
is  to  say,  by  general  ticket.  It  is  further  provided, 
however,  that  communes  of  more  than  ten  thousand 
people  may  be  divided  into  sections  electorates,  each  of 
which  may  choose  a  certain  number  of  councilors. 
But  these  sections  or  wards  may  not  be  very  small, 
for  each  one  of  them  must  have  at  least  four  council- 
ors to  elect.  Paris,  as  the  preceding  chapter  has  ex- 


Eleetion 

on  general 

ticket. 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  167 

plained,  is   altogether   exceptional.     Lyons   is   also     CHAP.  n. 
an  exception,  it  is  divided  by  law  into  six  perman- 
ent arrondissements,  to  which  are  distributed  the    Division  of 
fifty-four  members  of  the  council,  each  arrondisse-  intersections. 
ment  electing  its  group  of  councilors  on  a  single 
ticket.    As  for  Bordeaux,  Marseilles,  or  any  other 
large  town,  the  number  of  sections  electorales  cannot 
exceed  nine.    It  is  not  necessary  that  these  ward  lines 
should  be  frequently  changed  in  order  to  secure  equal- 
ity, inasmuch  as  the  law  provides  that  the  whole  num- 
ber of  councilors  shall  be  apportioned  to  the  sections 
in  the  ratio  of  the  number  of  voters  enrolled  on  the 
lists.    The  division  into  sections  is  not  required,  how- 
ever, and  there  are  towns  of  considerable  size  which     General 

ticket 

have  preferred  to  adhere  to  the  general  rule  of  the  for  sections. 
law  —  that  is  to  say,  to  elect  the  entire  body  of  coun- 
cilors upon  one  general  ticket.  The  twenty-three 
councilors  allotted  to  communes  having  populations 
between  3500  and  10,000  must  in  all  cases  be  chosen 
upon  a  general  ticket,  unless  it  should  happen  that 
the  commune  takes  the  form  of  a  large  country  town- 
ship with  two  or  more  entirely  distinct  villages,  in 
which  case  each  village  is  assigned  its  due  quota  of 
councilors.  Such  instances,  of  course,  are  not  very 
frequent. 

The  division  of  a  large  town  into  electoral  sections 
is  considered  a  matter  of  serious  importance,  and  it 
can  only  be  accomplished  in  accordance  with  a  careful 
and  deliberate  procedure  in  which  the  higher  author- 
ities as  well  as  the  municipal  council  must  participate,  precautions 
The  object  of  the  law  is  to  make  sure  that  there  is 
real  justification  for  the  creation  of  ward  lines  or  for 
their  rearrangement,  and  to  prevent  any  capricious 
change  for  gerrymandering  purposes.  Thus  the  pre- 
sumption is  in  favor  of  a  considerable  stability.  In 
every  case  the  four  or  more  councilorships  assigned 


168 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


The  four- 
year  term. 


CHAP.  ii.  to  a  section  must  be  filled  on  the  general-ticket  plan 
—  that  is  to  say,  each  voter  is  allowed  to  cast  his  ballot 
for  as  many  names  as  the  section  in  which  he  votes 
has  council  seats  to  fill.  This  division  into  sections 
is  not  a  matter  identical  with  the  arrangement  of  mere 
voting  precincts.  The  number  of  polling-places  is 
a  question  of  minor  convenience,  and  one  easily  ad- 
justed from  time  to  time. 

The  law  of  1884  increased  the  term  of  the  municipal 
councilors  to  four  years.  The  law  of  1871  had  re- 
duced it  to  three.1  Some  of  the  lawmakers  of  1884 
were  in  favor  of  the  principle  of  partial  renewal. 
They  favored  the  four-year  term  with  biennial  elec- 
tions, half  of  the  membership  of  the  council  retiring 
every  second  year.  A  renewal  of  the  entire  body, 
however,  once  every  four  years,  seemed  to  the  ma- 
Question  of  jority  to  be  in  more  natural  accord  with  the  genius  of 
the  French  system.  It  is  possibly  true  that  it  was 
better  adapted  to  French  conditions,  and  better  calcu- 
lated to  develop  the  habit  of  democratic  home  rule  in 
the  French  communities.  There  is  much  to  be  said 
on  both  sides,  although  partial  renewal  certainly  pro- 
motes continuity  in  the  management  of  municipal 
enterprises,  and  aids  in  the  execution  of  large  public 
works. 

The  municipal  elections  occur  simultaneously 
throughout  France  on  the  first  Sunday  in  May  every 
fourth  year.  The  propriety  of  a  separation  of  mu- 
nicipal from  other  elections  has  apparently  never  been 

1  There  has  been  much  variation  on  this  point  in  French  prac- 
tice. Thus,  in  1831  the  term  of  councilors  was  fixed  at  six  years, 
and  half  the  body  was  renewed  every  three  years.  The  law  of 
1855  prescribed  a  five-year  term,  the  whole  body  retiring  to- 
gether. In  1867  the  term  was  lengthened  to  seven  years,  and  in 
1870  it  was  reduced  again  to  five  years.  In  1871  it  was  further 
reduced  to  three,  and  in  1884  it  was  increased  to  four,  where 
it  has  since  remained. 


Municipal 
elections. 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


169 


Universal 

suffrage 

since  1834. 


questioned  in  France.  The  municipal  electorate  was  CHAP.  n. 
also  formerly  distinct.  The  third  republic  had  or- 
dained universal  suffrage  in  national  elections  for  all 
male  citizens  who  had  attained  the  age  of  twenty-one 
years  and  had  lived  six  months  in  the  commune 
where  they  were  enrolled.  But  for  the  municipal 
suffrage  some  tax-paying  qualifications  were  requisite, 
together  with  a  longer  period  of  residence.  The  law 
of  1884,  however,  removed  all  distinctions  and  unified 
the  voting-lists.  Consequently  the  municipal  suffrage 
may  now  be  exercised  by  every  Frenchman  who  has 
attained  his  majority,  has  lived  six  mouths  in  the 
commune,  and  has  not  lost  his  civil  rights  and  priv- 
ileges through  the  commission  of  a  crime  or  any  other 
disqualifying  act.  Thus,  universal  suffrage  in  France 
means  almost  precisely  what  the  same  term  signifies 
in  the  United  States. 

There  is  one  important  difference  to  be  noted,  how- 
ever, between  the  electoral  roll  of  a  large  French  town 
and  the  registration  list  of  a  corresponding  Amer- 
ican municipality.  The  French  system  of  taxation 
includes  not  only  several  kinds  of  property  taxes,  but 
also  a  classified  tax  upon  business  pursuits ;  and  every 
one  who  owns  property  or  carries  on  any  kind  of 
business  or  calling  in  a  town  is  entered  upon  the  tax- 
rolls.  The  electoral  laws  permit  any  man  thus  en- 
tered on  the  tax-rolls  of  a  commune  to  exercise  his 
voting  privileges  in  that  place.  Thus,  suburban  resi-  d°entnvoters! 
dents  who  live  beyond  the  municipal  confines  may 
vote  in  the  town  provided  they  do  business  or  pay 
taxes  there.  Such  men  are  also  eligible  for  election 
to  the  council  under  certain  limitations.  This  provi- 
sion does  not  in  fact  add  a  very  large  contingent  to 
the  municipal  voting-list,  but  it  is  a  reasonable  ar- 
rangement, and  a  convenient  one.  An  analogous 
arrangement  exists  in  England,  except  that  the 


A  provision 


170 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 

Suburbans 

may  choose 

their  voting 

place. 


Conduct  of 
an  election. 


Voting  sys- 
tem. 


The  second 
ballot. 


English  property-owner  may  vote  in  both  places. 
The  French  voter  may  under  no  circumstances  vote 
in  more  than  one  place ;  and  if  he  chooses  to  enroll 
himself  in  the  urban  commune  where  he  spends  his 
business  hours,  he  may  not  exercise  the  suffrage  in 
the  rural  commune  where  he  makes  his  domicile. 

In  the  small  communes,  which  need  only  one  poll- 
ing-place, the  mayor  presides  at  the  election.  Where 
there  are  several  polling-places  the  task  of  presiding 
officer  devolves  upon  the  mayor's  adjuncts,  and  then 
upon  the  members  of  the  municipal  council,  in  the 
regular  and  prescribed  order  of  their  names  as  entered 
upon  an  official  list.  Additional  appointments,  if 
necessary,  are  made  by  the  mayor.  Associated  with 
the  presiding  officer  as  election  judges  (assesseurs)  are 
the  two  oldest  voters  and  the  two  youngest  ones  who 
are  present  in  the  polling-room  at  the  time  when  tho 
polls  are  opened.  These  five  designate  the  secretary 
or  clerk  of  the  electoral  bureau,  who  has  a  voice  but 
not  a  vote  in  the  actions  of  the  board.  The  vot- 
ing system  is  a  well-devised  and  orderly  one,  al- 
though France  has  not  yet  adopted  the  official  ballot 
which  we  in  America  call  the  Australian  system. 
The  voter  prepares  his  ticket  before  entering  the 
voting-room,  and  hands  the  folded  paper,  which  must 
be  white  and  without  external  mark  or  sign,  to  the 
president  of  the  bureau,  who  deposits  it  in  the  ballot 
box.  The  name  of  each  voter  is  checked  upon  the 
certified  list  of  registered  voters  which  is  in  the  hands 
of  the  election  judges. 

It  is  commonly  expected  in  a  French  municipal 
election  that  a  supplementary  ballot  on  the  following 
Sunday  will  be  necessary.  This  is  because  the  law 
provides  that  no  candidate  may  be  declared  elected 
on  the  first  ballot  unless  he  has  obtained  an  absolute 
majority  of  all  the  votes  cast ;  and,  further,  unless  the 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


171 


number  of  votes  cast  for  him.  has  been  equal  to 
one  fourth  of  the  entire  number  of  voters  enrolled 
as  belonging  to  the  commune  or  section.  Under 
certain  circumstances,  as  when  the  voting  strength  is 
principally  divided  between  two  tickets,  the  first  bal- 
lot may  be  conclusive  for  every  seat  in  the  municipal 
council.  But  when,  as  very  frequently  occurs,  there 
are  several  tickets  in  the  field,  together  with  much 
scratching  and  substitution,  the  supplementary  ballot 
will  usually  be  necessary.  On  the  second  ballot  those 
candidates  who  have  the  largest  number  of  votes  are 
declared  elected,  whether  or  not  they  have  an  ab- 
solute majority. 

Thus,  to  illustrate  concretely,  let  us  say  that  B — , 
which  is  a  town  of  ten  thousand  people,  with  ap- 
proximately two  thousand  registered  voters,  is  hold- 
ing its  municipal  election.  Twenty- three  councilors 
are  to  be  chosen  upon  general  ticket.  Each  elector 
votes  for  a  full  list  of  twenty-three.  It  may  well 
happen  that  a  hundred  different  individuals  are  voted 
for.  No  one  can  be  elected  on  the  first  ballot  unless 
he  secures  more  than  half  of  all  the  votes  actually 
cast,  and,  further,  unless  this  half  be  more  than  five 
hundred, —  that  is  to  say,  more  than  one  quarter  of  the 
total  electorate.  Let  us  suppose  that  ten  candidates 
receive  the  requisite  majority.  They  are  declared 
elected,  and  the  mayor  duly  announces  the  opening  of 
the  polls  on  the  following  Sunday  for  the  election  of 
the  remaining  thirteen.  At  the  second  polling  each 
voter  is  entitled  to  deposit  a  ballot  containing  thir- 
teen names ;  and  the  thirteen  who  stand  highest  when 
the  votes  are  counted  are  entitled  to  seats  in  the 
council.  In  the  large  towns  where  a  division  into 
sections  has  been  made,  and  where  each  section  has 
perhaps  only  four  or  five  councilors  to  elect,  the 
method  is  not  different,  although  the  short  list  is 


CHAP.  IL 


Majority  re- 
quisite on 
first  ballot, 
but  not  on 
second. 


A  concrete 
instance. 


172 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 

No  provision 
for  minority 
representa- 
tion. 


Qualifica- 
tions for 
council. 


Value  of 

'  scrutin  de 

liste." 


obviously  somewhat  easier  to  manage  than  a  long  one. 
It  will  be  seen  that  the  French  system  makes  no  pro- 
vision for  the  cumulation  of  votes,  or  for  any  plan  of 
proportional  or  minority  representation.  French  ex- 
perience in  government  by  popular  elections  was  per- 
haps not  considered  mature  enough  to  justify  experi- 
ments and  innovations  which  England,  Switzerland, 
or  even  the  United  States  might  test  with  safety  and 
advantage. 

Members  of  the  council  must  be  twenty-five  years 
old.  In  other  respects  they  have  the  same  qualifica- 
tions as  the  voters.  It  is,  however,  provided  that  not 
more  than  one  fourth  of  the  members  of  the  council 
can  be  elected  from  among  those  voters  who  do  not 
have  their  actual  domicile  within  the  boundaries  of 
the  commune.  This  limitation  is  scarcely  necessary, 
inasmuch  as  the  natural  tendency  in  France,  as  every- 
where else,  is  in  favor  of  candidates  who  reside  in 
the  same  area  with  the  voting  constituency.  A  resi- 
dent of  one  section  of  a  French  city  is  entirely  eligible 
as  a  candidate  for  election  in  any  other  section,  but 
his  chances  of  success,  generally  speaking,  would  be 
weakened  outside  of  his  own  district.  The  French 
statesmen  have  recognized  the  fact  that  the  scrutin 
de  liste,  or  general  ticket,  tends  to  secure  a  higher  aver- 
age degree  of  character  and  ability  in  municipal  coun- 
cils and  other  representative  bodies  than  the  plan  of 
one-name  districts.  They  have,  therefore,  done  well  to 
retain  that  principle ;  and  their  rejection  of  it  in  the 
election  of  the  members  of  the  Paris  council  is  a  con- 
spicuous exception  which  experience  condemns. 

Having  elected  their  municipal  councilors,  the 
voters  have  performed  their  one  chief  task.  They 
have  conferred  upon  a  chosen  group  of  their  fellow- 
citizens  the  right  to  exercise  all  the  powers  which  are 
by  law  reposed  in  the  municipal  organism.  The 


THE   FEENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM 


173 


council  proceeds  without  delay  to  clioose  from  its 
own  membership  the  mayor  and  his  so-called  adjuncts 
or  assistants.  These  are  all  appointed  for  the  full 
term  of  four  years.  The  council  elects  them  by  bal- 
lot. On  the  first  and  second  votes  an  absolute  ma- 
jority is  requisite.  If  such  a  majority  has  been  lacking, 
a  third  ballot  will  suffice,  the  candidate  who  then  has  a 
plurality  of  votes  being  declared  elected.  In  the  case 
of  a  "  tie,"  the  office  is  accorded  to  the  oldest  of  the  can- 
didates who  have  received  an  equal  number  of  votes. 

The  number  of  adjuncts  varies  in  accordance  with 
the  size  of  the  commune.  Those  having  less  than 
twenty-five  hundred  inhabitants  elect  only  one  ad- 
junct, while  those  whose  population  is  between  twen- 
ty-five hundred  and  ten  thousand  elect  two.  One 
more  is  then  added  for  each  twenty-five  thousand  ad- 
ditional population,  with  the  proviso  that  the  maxi- 
mum number  shall  not  exceed  twelve.  An  exception 
is  made  in  the  case  of  Lyons,  the  council  of  which  is 
authorized  to  designate  seventeen  adjuncts.  Apart 
from  Paris  and  Lyons,  all  the  large  towns  and  cities 
of  France,  therefore,  have  municipal  councils  of  thirty- 
six  members,  which  are  not  merely  permitted  but  re- 
quired to  appoint  from  their  own  number  a  mayor 
and  the  prescribed  number  of  adjuncts  or  executive 
assistants. 

The  mayor  is  the  presiding  officer  of  the  council 
and  the  executive  head  of  the  municipality.  His 
range  of  duties  is  wide  and  responsible.  He  assigns 
various  administrative  tasks  to  his  adjuncts.  With- 
out attempting  to  enter  too  minutely  into  details,  it 
may  readily  be  seen  that  the  mayor  and  his  adjuncts 
constitute  in  effect  a  standing  executive  committee  of 
the  council,  responsible  for  the  every-day  administra- 
tion of  municipal  affairs.  Under  the  French  system 
the  full  council  does  not  of  necessity  hold  veiy  fre- 


CHAP.  II. 

Choosing  the 

mayors  and 

adjuncts. 


Number  of 
adjuncts. 


Kelation  of 
mayor  to 
council. 


174 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Frequency 
of  sessions. 


The  law 
needlessly 
exacting. 


Committees 
of  the  coun- 
cil. 


quent  sittings.  Four  sessions  each  year  are  prescribed 
by  law.  Three  of  these  so-called  ordinary  sessions 
may  last  for  fifteen  days  each,  while  the  fourth  —  in 
which  the  annual  budget  is  discussed,  and  the  general 
official  policy  of  the  municipality  is  debated  for  the 
following  year  —  is  permitted  to  remain  in  session  for 
six  weeks.  Meantime,  there  may  be  as  many  so-called 
extraordinary  sessions  as  the  mayor  wishes  to  call. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  council  itself  has  due  initia- 
tive, and  a  majority  may  at  any  time  appoint  a  meet- 
ing, which  the  mayor  is  obliged  to  convoke  in  regular 
form. 

It  may  fairly  be  claimed  that  the  French  law  gives 
itself  needless  concern  in  its  attempt  to  prescribe  the 
dates  and  duration  of  the  ordinary  sessions  of  mu- 
nicipal councils.  The  matter  is  one  which  of  neces- 
sity tends  to  regulate  itself  according  to  the  views  of 
particular  localities.  Thus  it  may  readily  be  seen 
that  in  one  commune  the  four  formal  sessions  might 
almost  entirely  suffice,  while  some  other  municipality 
might  prefer  to  hold  an  extraordinary  meeting  twice 
a  month,  or  even  once  a  week,  and  thus  to  avoid  very 
protracted  sessions  when  the  quarterly  dates  pre- 
scribed by  law  have  come  around.  The  executive 
group,  composed  of  the  mayor  and  his  adjuncts,  is 
expected  to  meet  with  considerable  frequency  at  the 
call  of  the  mayor. 

The  council  itself  also  appoints  a  number  of  stand- 
ing committees  for  the  consideration  of  important 
subjects,  or  the  general  oversight  of  particular  de- 
partments. All  these  committees  have  the  mayor  as 
nominal  chairman,  although  the  actual  duties  of  the 
chairmanship  are  usually  performed  by  one  of  the 
adjuncts,  who  is  assigned  to  act  in  the  mayor's  stead. 
This  adjunct  would  naturally  be  the  one  charged  by 
the  mayor  with  the  active  executive  oversight  of  the 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


175 


department  in  which  the  committee  is  interested.    The     CHAP.  n. 
standing  committees  of  a  French  municipal  council 
are  of  veiy  much  less  importance  than  those  of  an 
English  council.    In  England  the  council  itself,  work-     compared 

...  with  English 

rug  through  its  standing  committees,  is  an  admmistra-  committees. 
tive  as  well  as  a  deliberative  and  financial  body.  But 
in  France  the  council  assigns  all  administrative  and 
executive  duties  to  the  mayor  and  his  adjuncts.  Thus 
a  standing  committee  in  a  French  council  consults, 
advises,  and  keeps  itself  informed,  and  it  may  exer- 
cise a  considerable  influence  over  the  action  of  the 
mayor  and  adjuncts  ;  but  it  does  not  act  of  itself. 

In  England  the  council,  on  the  recommendation  of 
the  standing  committees,  makes  all  appointments  of 
municipal  officers  and  employees,  while  in  France  the  f^fy°rh£ft 
mayor  exercises  the  entire  appointing  power  except  ing  power. 
as  regards  certain  offices  which  the  law  specifically  re- 
quires to  be  filled  in  some  other  way.  The  British 
mayor  is  merely  the  presiding  officer  of  the  council, 
holding  his  place  for  only  one  year  and  possessing  no 
administrative  authority  or  power  of  appointment. 
In  the  French,  as  in  some  American  municipalities, 
the  mayor  is  the  executive  head  with  powers  and  du- 
ties  which  would  seem  to  give  him  almost  the  position  can  system- 
of  a  dictator.  The  sharp  distinction,  however,  be- 
tween the  French  and  American  systems  lies  in  the 
fact  that  the  French  mayor  is  not  only  a  member  of 
the  council  and  the  council's  presiding  officer,  but 
that  he  and  his  adjuncts  owe  their  appointments  en- 
tirely to  their  fellow-councilors. 

Thus  in  fact  the  English  and  French  systems  both 
have  perfect  unity,  and  the  municipal  council  is  the 

%  .  J  '  ^  . 

central  and  important  fact  in  both.  If  I  am  not  mis- 
taken  in  the  tendency  of  things,  as  the  system  actually 
works  in  France  the  real  influence  of  the  council  is 
increasing  at  the  expense  of  that  of  the  mayor.  It 


Growth  of 

the  council's 

influence. 


176  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  ii.  could  not  well  be  otherwise,  where  the  council  is  com- 
posed of  active  and  intelligent  men.  The  standing 
committees  must  inevitably  grow  in  influence,  and 
the  adjuncts  in  the  course  of  time  must,  it  would  seem 
to  me,  find  themselves  in  very  much  the  same  position 

Tendency  to  asthe  chairmen  of  the  chief  committees  of  an  English 

the'rayor.  council.  The  mayor,  under  the  French  system,  will 
doubtless  long  continue  to  be  intrusted  with  the 
general  oversight  and  control  of  the  executive  work 
of  the  commune;  but  I  am  not  disposed  to  believe 
that  he  will  always  hold  so  dominant  a  place  as 
the  law  of  1884  seems  to  contemplate.  Experience 
will  soon  begin  to  show  how  far  the  French  councils, 
without  any  changes  in  the  law,  will  be  able  to  make 
the  mayor  practically  their  obedient  servant  in  the 
performance  of  his  executive  functions. 

Councilors,  mayors,  and  adjuncts  are  all  required 
to  serve  without  salary.    Allowances  may  be  voted  to 

NO  salaries,  cover  actual  expenses  incurred  in  connection  with  the 
performance  of  official  duty ;  but  such  outlays  are  as 
a  rule  rather  strictly  construed, —  although,  as  I  have 
shown  in  the  preceding  chapter,  the  Paris  council  has 
not  been  altogether  self-denying. 

Every  mayor  in  France,  while  filling  primarily  the 

The  mayor's  position  of  chief  of  the  local  administration,  is  also 

dual  capac-     f  ' 

ity.  regarded  as  a  representative,  for  certain  specified  pur- 
poses, of  the  higher  authority.  The  law  very  dis- 
tinctly ascribes  to  him  this  double  character.  It 
recites  that  he  is  charged  —  under  the  control  of  the 
municipal  council  and  the  surveillance  of  the  higher 
authorities  —  with  the  care  and  management  of  the 
communal  property ;  with  the  oversight  of  the  munic- 
ipal revenues  and  the  treasury  accounts;  with  the 
preparation  of  the  annual  budget  and  estimates ;  with 
the  direction  of  the  public  works  of  the  commune; 
with  power  over  measures  pertaining  to  ways  of  com- 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  177 

munication ;  with  the  leasing  of  places  in  the  markets,     CHAP.  n. 
and  the  making  of  other  contracts,  leases,  and  conces- 
sions in  accordance  with  forms  duly  prescribed  by 
law:  with  various  acts  involving  sales,  acquisitions  r 

i  i  •  in      n    i  •    •  First,  as  rep- 

and  business  transactions  in  behalf  of  the  municipal-    resentative 

.,  ,  i          ,    i       i    . -i     T  -ii  ±'  of  the  com- 

ity under  rules  duly  laid  down ;  with  representation       mune. 

of  the  commune  in  matters  of  litigation,  whether  as 
plaintiff  or  defendant ;  with  the  execution  of  various 
other  matters  particularly  specified,  and  in  general 
with  the  carrying  out  of  the  decisions  of  the  municipal 
council.  The  exercise  of  these  general  powers  in- 
volves the  appointment  of  most  of  the  municipal  em- 
ployees, and  this  power  of  appointment  also  carries 
with  it  the  power  of  suspension  and  removal,  although 
certain  limitations  and  safeguards  surround  the  ap- 
pointing and  removing  power. 

As  an  agent  of  the  superior  authority  and  an  officer 
of  the  republic,  each  mayor  is  charged  with  the  duty 
of  seeing  that  the  general  laws  are  executed  in  the  second,  as 

„,,,.,„  i      XT-  •  agent  of  the 

commune.  To  this  end,  for  example,  the  mayor  is  an  state. 
officer  of  the  6tat  civil,  that  is  to  say,  must  carry  out 
the  national  laws  touching  the  registration  of  births, 
deaths,  marriages,  etc.  He  has  to  do  with  the  execu- 
tion of  the  military-service  laws,  with  the  collection 
of  the  commune's  share  of  national  taxes,  and  with 
all  other  matters  which  the  laws  of  the  land  may  pre- 
scribe. If  in  the  performance  of  these  duties  toward 
the  state  the  mayor  should  be  recreant  or  negligent, 
he  is  subject  to  suspension  by  the  prefect  of  the 
department. 

This  suspension  must  not  be  arbitrary,  but  must  be   Liability  to 
for  reasons  fully  set  forth,  and  it  may  hold  good  for   <™pension. 
only  one  month,  during  which  the  matter  must  be  re- 
ferred to  the  central  government.    The  minister  of 
the  interior  may  prolong  the  suspension   to  three 

months.    The  president  of  the  republic,  acting  in  the 
12 


178  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.  council  of  state,  may,  for  reasons  which  must  be  fully 
expressed,  remove  a  mayor  from  his  office.  This  pro- 
cess of  suspension  or  removal  applies  equally  to  any 
or  all  of  the  mayor's  adjuncts.  Such  action  by  the 
higher  authorities  does  not  carry  with  it  any  loss  of 
membership  or  standing  in  the  municipal  council. 
The  dismissal  of  a  mayor  by  the  President  of  the 
Republic  holds  good  for  one  year,  at  the  end  of  which 
the  person  dismissed  becomes  eligible  again. 

Under  previous  regimes,  the  power  of  suspension 
and  dismissal  was  far  greater  than  that  defined  in  the 
law  of  1884;  and  the  entire  municipal  council  was 
in  like  manner  liable  to  arbitrary  suspension  and  ulti- 

Power  to  . 

suspend  or    mate  dissolution  as  a  penalty  for  having  incurred  the 

dissolve  r  ° 

councils,  serious  displeasure  of  the  prefect  or  the  central  gov- 
ernment. It  still  holds  true  that  an  entire  munici- 
pal council  may  be  suspended,  or  even  dissolved,  by 
decree  of  the  President  of  the  Republic ;  but  no  great 
hardship  accrues  to  the  municipality,  for  an  election 
must  at  once  be  held  to  choose  a  new  council,  and  the 
councilors  who  have  been  dismissed  are  reeligible  and 
may  seek  vindication  at  the  hands  of  their  constit- 
uents. The  power  to  suspend  or  dissolve  a  French 
municipal  council  under  the  present  laws  is  to  be 
regarded  as  one  to  be  exercised  at  rare  intervals,  and 
upon  occasions  where  it  would  appear  that  the  inter- 
Rarely  used,  ests  of  the  commune  itself  would  make  this  summary 
proceeding  desirable.  For  example,  if  it  were  shown 
that  the  majority  in  a  municipal  council  had  been 
guilty  of  bribe-taking  or  gross  corruption,  the  sum- 
mary dismissal  of  the  whole  council  would  dispose 
conveniently  of  the  situation. 

The  suspension  or  dismissal  of  a  mayor  might  on 
the  one  hand  be  due  to  his  alleged  mismanagement  of 
municipal  affairs,  or  on  the  other  hand  to  his  derelic- 
tion in  those  matters  wherein  he  acts  as  the  agent  of 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM  179 

the  state.  It  is  chiefly  in  his  capacity  as  an  agent  of  CHAP.  n. 
the  general  government,  charged  with  the  local  exe- 
cution of  the  national  laws,  that  he  is  under  the 
surveillance  of  the  prefect.  Yet  it  remains  true  that 
a  large  part  of  the  important  municipal  work  of  the 
council  and  mayor  requires  for  its  full  validity  the  surveillance 

over  finan- 

assent  of  the  higher  authorities.    Thus  the  budgets    ciaiopera- 

•  11  n  .  tions  of  mu- 

of  small  communes  must  bear  the  approving  counter-  nicipaiities. 
sign  of  the  prefect  before  they  can  have  legal  effect, 
while  the  large  municipalities  must  send  their  yearly 
volume  of  budgetary  proposals  to  the  minister  of  the 
interior,  upon  whose  advice  the  President  of  the  Re- 
public either  approves  of  it,  or  else  returns  it  with 
criticisms  for  revision.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that 
the  surveillance  now  exercised  by  the  higher  authori- 
ties over  the  financial  transactions  of  the  communes 
and  municipalities  is,  upon  the  whole,  beneficial 
rather  than  hampering  and  arbitrary.  It  holds  the 
local  governments,  great  and  small,  to  businesslike 

Beneficial 

methods,  and  to  standards  of  promptness  and  em-  results. 
ciency.  Anything  like  slipshod  or  irregular  proceed- 
ings would  meet  with  an  instant  check  through  this 
system.  As  in  the  British  Local  Government  Board, 
— which  exercises  a  somewhat  analogous  though  not 
precisely  similar  supervision  over  local  administra- 
tion in  England, — one  finds  in  the  great  office  of  the 
Minister  of  the  Interior  at  Paris  a  well-equipped  bu- 
reau of  permanent  expert  officials  trained  in  every  Present  reia- 
phase  of  municipal  finance,  and  qualified  to  exercise  tween  cen- 
intelligent  supervision  over  the  budgets  of  the  French 
towns.  I  am  not  aware  that  there  are  any  just  com- 
plaints of  capricious  interference.  And  thus  it  may  be 
asserted  as  a  general  principle  that  municipal  initia- 
tive and  freedom  of  action  have  found  themselves 
greatly  enlarged  under  the  system  of  1884,  while  the 
supervision  of  the  higher  authorities  has  been  exer- 


180  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  IL  cised  under  due  safeguards,  and  has  not  frequently 
or  seriously  interrupted  the  reasonable  exercise  of 
local  self-government.  Its  chief  effect  has  been  that 
of  a  wholesome  preventive  against  lax  and  irregular 
methods. 

It  is  difficult  for  a  foreigner  to  satisfy  himself  that 
his  knowledge  is  wide  enough  to  justify  him  in  ex- 
pressing an  opinion  touching  the  average  character 
and  ability  of  the  men  elected  in  the  French  towns  as 
character  of  municipal  councilors.  Formerly,  it  may  be  said,  the 
councilors,  councilors  of  the  larger  towns  represented  fairly  well 
the  property-holding  or  mercantile  community.  The 
tendency  under  the  broader  municipal  suffrage  which 
was  introduced  in  1884  has  been  to  bring  a  larger 
number  of  working-men's  representatives  into  the 
councils,  and  to  replace  the  more  conservative  politi- 
cal elements  to  some  extent  by  extreme  radicals  and 
socialists.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether  this  recent 
tendency  will  prevail  yet  more  widely,  or  whether  on 
the  other  hand  it  may  prove  to  be  a  passing  phase. 
Taking  a  broad  and  general  view,  I  have  formed  the 
impression  that  the  municipal  councils  of  France 
fairly  reflect  the  prevailing  standards  of  personal 
honesty  and  uprightness,  and  that  in  the  large  towns 
as  well  as  in  the  smaller  ones  the  intelligence  of  the 
community  is  very  well  represented.  If  I  were  to 
More  radical  venture  upon  a  dangerous  comparison  I  should  be 
disposed,  after  asking  that  due  allowance  be  made 
for  numerous  exceptions,  to  entertain  the  view  that  in 
the  present  decade  the  French  councils  have  been  less 
substantial  and  responsible  bodies  than  those  of  the 
large  English  and  German  towns,  while  far  superior 
in  these  qualities  to  those  of  American  cities  of  cor- 
responding size. 

The  sessions  of  the  French  councils  were  formerly 
held  with  closed  doors.    One  of  the  important  inno- 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


181 


CHAP.  n. 

°Pen 


rations  of  the  law  of  1884  was  to  throw  the  council 
meetings  open,  and  thus  to  give  public  opinion  a  bet- 
ter  opportunity  to  make  itself  felt  in  local  affairs. 

The  law  arranges  an  elaborate  classification  of  the 
so-called  attributions  of  municipal  councils.  First,  — 
and  by  far  the  most  extensive  under  the  present  lib- 
eral regime,  —  are  those  functions  which  belong  com- 
pletely and  finally  to  the  councils,  without  necessity 
of  submission  to  any  higher  authority.  Then  come 
the  so-called  deliberations  exfoutoires  apr&s  approba- 
tion. These  involve  such  matters  as  the  alienation  of  T 

•    •  i  •  11  i        Functions  of 

municipal  property,  the  making  of  long  leases,  the  the  councils. 
granting  of  charters  to  companies,  the  annual  budget, 
and  a  few  other  matters.  The  council  takes  the  in- 
itiative in  all  these  things,  but  before  its  action  can 
be  deemed  final  the  prefect,  sitting  in  his  prefectoral 
council,  must  give  his  formal  approval.  He  must  act 
promptly,  and  in  case  of  his  failure  to  indorse,  the 
municipal  council  has  the  right  of  appeal  to  the 
minister  of  the  interior.  It  is,  in  my  judgment,  a  rea-  check  upon 
sonable  precaution  not  to  permit  a  municipal  council  grants,  etc. 
to  grant  valuable  privileges  or  alienate  public  prop- 
erty without  the  surveillance  and  approval  of  the 
higher  authorities.  The  check  operates  in  practice  to 
lessen  the  chances  of  bribery  and  corruption,  and  to 
prevent  hasty  and  ill-advised  action.  The  laws  very 
carefully  protect  the  municipalities  against  transac- 
tions in  which  members  of  the  council  can  be  shown 
to  have  an  undue  personal  interest. 

The  exercise  of  ordinary  police  authority  is  vested 
in  the  mayor.  He  has  the  power  of  appointment  and 
promotion,  and  is  charged  by  the  laws  with  a  long 
list  of  duties  which  are  regarded  as  properly  pertain- 
ing to  the  police  administration.  All  appointments, 
however,  must  be  ratified  by  the  prefect  of  the  de- 

partment;  and  while  the  mayors  have  the  right  to 
12* 


182 


CHAP.  II. 


President 

must  pass 

upon  police 

system  of 

cities. 


The  Lyons 
police  sys- 
tem excep- 
tional. 


suspend  police  officers,  no  dismissal  can  be  valid  with- 
out the  concurrence  of  the  prefect.  The  laws  further 
provide  that  the  general  organization  of  the  police 
system  of  towns  and  cities  having  more  than  forty 
thousand  people  shall  be  prescribed  in  a  decree  em- 
anating from  the  President  of  the  Republic  him- 
self. In  towns  of  less  than  forty  thousand  the  mayor 
is  entitled  to  exercise  his  own  judgment  in  the  organ- 
ization of  the  police  department.  The  rule  which  au- 
thorizes the  President  of  the  Republic  to  pronounce 
upon  the  police  system  of  the  large  towns  is  not  in- 
tended as  an  interference  with  municipal  freedom  and 
initiative,  but  rather  as  a  means  by  which  to  insure 
general  uniformity  and  efficiency  in  police  methods. 

The  description  I  have  given  of  the  police  system  of 
Paris  would  serve  to  convey  a  general  idea  of  organi- 
zation and  method  in  Lyons,  Marseilles,  Bordeaux, 
and  all  the  other  provincial  centers.  The  police  sys- 
tem of  Lyons,  like  that  of  Paris,  is  under  what  is 
termed  a  regime  exceptional.  A  number  of  suburban 
communes  are  joined  to  the  large  urban  commune 
of  Lyons  in  order  to  constitute  one  general  police 
district;  and  the  prefect  of  the  Rhone  department, 
rather  than  the  mayor  of  Lyons,  exercises  active  con- 
trol over  the  metropolitan  police  system  of  the  "  ag- 
glomfoation  Lyonnaise."  In  all  other  French  cities  and 
towns  without  exception  the  mayor  is  the  responsible 
head  of  the  police  department.  I  need  not  explain 
that  one  or  more  of  his  adjuncts  or  executive  assist- 
ants may  be  deputed  by  him  to  assume  executive 
charge  of  the  work  in  part  or  as  a  whole,  and  that  the 
municipal  council,  through  a  standing  committee  or 
otherwise,  may  exercise  a  considerable  influence. 

The  estimates  of  necessary  expenditure  for  the 
maintenance  of  police  operations,  when  submitted 
by  the  mayor,  must  be  granted  by  the  municipal 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  183 

council.    In  the  case  of  the  smaller  communes,  the     CHAP-  IL 
prefect  of  the  department  would  have  authority  to 

.,.,,,.,  ,  J,,        Police  budg- 

mscribe  in  the  budget  such  necessary  sums  as  the  etsarecom- 
municipal  council  had  failed  to  grant  by  its  vote. 
In  like  manner  the  President  of  the  Republic,  acting 
in  the  council  of  state,  is  empowered  to  inscribe 
in  the  budgets  of  the  large  municipalities  (those 
having  more  than  40,000  people)  the  sums  deemed 
requisite  to  maintain  an  efficient  police  organization. 
The  administrative  authority  of  the  mayor,  under  his 
general  title  to  exercise  police  power,  extends  to 
various  measures  for  the  protection  of  the  public  scope  of 
health,  and  includes  the  lighting  and  cleansing  of  the  "raTpoifce1" 
streets,  together  with  the  regulation  of  numerous 
matters  which  relate  to  the  good  order,  welfare,  and 
convenience  of  the  community.  The  granting  of 
building  permits,  the  enforcement  of  rules  having 
to  do  with  the  street  line,  and  the  control  of  many 
questions  relating  to  construction  are  also  enumerated 
in  the  definition  of  the  mayor's  police  authority. 

The  mayor's  jurisdiction  in  matters  pertaining  to 
the  street  system  is  brought  at  certain  points  into     Authority 
very  close  and  delicate  contact  with  the  authority  of    streets- 
the  prefect  and  the  higher  functionaries.     This  seem- 
ing possibility  of  conflict  arises  from  the  fact  that 
the  public  highways  of  France  are  divided  into  sev- 
eral classes,  each  of  which  is  subject  to  a  different 
control.     First  there  are  the  routes  nationales,  some- 
times known  as  the  system  of  national  military  roads. 
Radiating  from  Paris,  and  connecting  the  chief  towns  National  and 
of  the  country,  one  finds  a  series  of  magnificent  roads    ^^roads? 
under  the  care  of  the  national  engineers,  maintained 
in  larger  part  at  the  expense  of  the  republic,  and 
coming  under  the  control  of  the  superior  authorities. 
Each  department,  in  its  turn,  has  its  own  system  of  so- 
called  routes  departementales.     These  are  admirable 


184  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

/ 

CHAP.  ii.  macadamized  highways  which  connect  the  princi- 
pal town  of  the  department  with  the  chief  places  of 
the  arrondissernents  and  cantons,  and  which  bind 
together  all  the  important  towns  of  the  division. 
They  are  controlled  by  the  departmental  authorities 
and  maintained  at  the  department's  expense.  De- 
scending to  the  smaller  circumscriptions,  one  finds 
a  system  of  routes  vicinaux,  and  finally,  in  the  rural 
Local  roads,  communes,  the  chemins  ruraux  (country  roads),  while 
the  towns  have  their  ordinary  municipal  street  system. 
But  in  all  towns  of  considerable  size  there  are  main 
streets  which  belong  to  the  system  of  national  roads, 
and  other  streets  which  are  regarded  as  belonging  to 
the  departmental  system.  The  authority  of  the  mayor 

and  the  municipal  council  over  such  main  thorough- 
Different  .  .  .  e 
jurisdictions,  fares  is  not  so  complete  as  over  the  network  or  ordi- 
nary streets.  Not  to  enter  into  an  explanation  which 
would  involve  many  distinctions  and  technicalities,  it- 
may  be  quite  sufficient  to  make  the  general  statement 
that  the  authorities  of  the  republic  and  those  of  the 
department,  under  the  existing  regime,  show  a  con- 
stantly increasing  tendency  to  make  the  mayor  and 
the  municipal  council  their  trusted  representatives  in 
almost  everything  that  has  to  do  with  those  portions 
of  the  national  or  departmental  road  systems  that  lie 
within  the  limits  of  a  municipality.  When  questions 
of  street-railway  franchises  or  of  other  concessions 
questions,  and  privileges  upon  the  street  surface  or  beneath  it 
arise,  it  becomes  necessary  for  the  municipality  first 
to  obtain  a  concession  on  its  own  behalf  from  the 
higher  authorities,  whereupon  it  can  proceed  to  deal 
in  its  own  way  with  the  company  or  the  individual 
seeking  a  franchise  or  concession.  These  matters 
rest  in  no  confusion  whatsoever.  They  all  have  been 
reduced  to  a  system  which,  if  elaborate  in  some  cases, 
is  always  logical,  definite,  and  lucid. 

The  network  of  streets  and  highways  throughout 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  185 

France  has  been  brought  to  marvelous  perfection  CHAP.  n. 
through    the    application  of    the  best  engineering 

methods.     The  roads  and  streets  of  the  minor  divi-  Perfection  of 
sions,  as  well  as  the  chief  routes  of  the  nation  and  of 


the  departments,  have,  as  a  rule,  been  laid  out  and 
constructed  under  the  oversight  of  the  trained  en- 
gineers of  the  national  public-  works  department.  If 
the  high  state  of  administrative  centralization  which 
has  prevailed  during  most  of  the  century  has  rested 
in  large  part  upon  false  and  mistaken  principles,  let 
us  not  forget  that  some  permanent  benefits  have  re- 
sulted from  it.  And  of  all  these  benefits,  perhaps  the 
most  tangible  one  has  been  France's  incomparably 
complete  system  of  macadamized  highways.  It  was 
inaugurated,  and  has  been  developed,  as  a  central  and 
national  rather  than  a  local  policy;  and  while  it  has 
been  a  costly  creation,  it  stands  as  one  of  the  great, 
permanent  factors  in  the  wealth-production  of  France. 
Its  cost  has  been  repaid  many  times  over  ;  and  no  one 
doubts  the  advantage  of  liberal  yearly  appropriations 
from  national,  departmental,  and  communal  treasuries 
to  maintain  its  perfect  condition.  Very  few  new  roads 
are  in  the  process  of  making  in  France,  the  system 
being  practically  complete.  The  repair,  cleansing,  and 
watering  of  the  roads  and  streets  of  the  entire  country  Maintenanc 
employ  a  vast  army  of  laborers,  and  these  tasks  are 
almost  as  minutely  and  methodically  performed  for 
the  highways  that  radiate  throughout  the  country  as 
for  the  boulevards  of  Paris. 

If  the  great  provincial  towns  of  France  have  at- 
tracted comparatively  little  attention  as  examples  of 
modern  municipal  expansion  and  transformation,  it 
is  only  because  Paris  has  so  preeminently  represented 
French  municipal  methods  ;  and  also,  perhaps,  because 
the  rate  of  development  has  not  been  so  rapid  of 
late  in  the  French  commercial  and  industrial  towns 


186 


MUNICIPAL   GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


The  provin- 
cial capitals. 


Transforma- 
tions like 
that  of  Paris. 


Lille  as  an 
example. 


Boulevards 
and  street 
reforms. 


Attractive 
appoint- 
ments. 


as  in  those  of  Great  Britain  and  Germany.  Never- 
theless, one  may  find  exceedingly  attractive  illustra- 
tions of  the  modern  municipal  movement  in  the  re- 
cent progress  of  the  provincial  capitals  of  France. 
It  is  true  these  towns  are  not  growing  in  numbers 
as  fast  as  those,  of  several  other  countries,  but  they 
are  gaining  very  remarkably,  while  the  population  of 
France  as  a  whole  remains  at  a  stand-still,  and  that  of 
many  hundreds  of  the  rural  communes  has  been  ap- 
preciably declining. 

Speaking  in  generalities,  the  period  which  has  wit- 
nessed the  transformation  of  Paris  has  seen  a  less 
marvelous  but  quite  analogous  change  in  the  other 
French  towns.  This  general  movement  may  be  il- 
lustrated by  a  citation  of  several  concrete  examples. 
The  town  of  Lille, —  chief  place  of  the  Nord  depart- 
ment,—  has  now  considerably  more  than  two  hundred 
thousand  inhabitants.  Forty  years  ago,  in  1856,  it 
had  scarcely  more  than  seventy- five  thousand.  It 
was  at  that  time  hemmed  in  by  an  ancient  cincture  of 
fortifications  which  gave  it  an  elliptical  form,  the 
major  axis  being  about  a  mile  and  a  half  long,  while 
the  shorter  one  was  considerably  less  than  a  mile. 
Half  of  the  old  line  of  fortifications  was  demolished 
to  make  way  for  a  broad  central  boulevard,  which 
extends  in  a  perfectly  straight  line  across  the  present 
city.  South  of  this  line  there  was  annexed  a  new 
area  of  greater  extent  than  the  old  city,  and  this  is 
laid  out  upon  the  Parisian  system  with  noble  boule- 
vards and  avenues,  while  the  entire  town  within  the 
present  enlarged  limits  is  encircled  by  a  series  of 
boulevards  of  great  width  and  attractiveness.  The 
public  buildings  are  excellent  specimens  of  modern 
French  civic  architecture.  The  town  has  its  great 
public  museum  of  art,  one  of  the  most  noteworthy  in 
France,  its  important  municipal  library,  and  its  elabo- 


THE  FRENCH  M[JNICIPAL   SYSTEM  187 

rate  educational    system  extending  from  the  faole    CHAP.  n. 
maternelle  up  to  the  university,  with  technical  and 
industrial  schools  which  bear  due  relationship  to  the 
textile,  chemical,  and  other  industries  that  flourish  in 
the  town.    The  street-railway  system  is  not  extensive, 
for  Lille  is  an  exceedingly  compact  town ;  yet  there  Liiie's  street- 
are  thirteen  lines  radiating  conveniently  from  one  or  rai  Vtem.sys 
two  central  points  and  serving  not  only  the  town  itself 
but  the  adjacent  suburban  communes.     This  transit 
system  is  unified  under  a  single  ownership  and  man- 
agement.    It  pays  a  modest  compensation  to  the 
municipality  for  its  privileges  in  the  streets,  and  is 
subject  to  minute  municipal  regulation  touching  its 
fares,  routes,  and  all  the  details  of  its  operation. 

The  advocate  of  the  direct  municipal  ownership  and 
operation  of  such  supply-services  as  lighting  or  tran-  L.  htin  and 
sit,  will  not  find  it  advantageous  to  visit  the  French    transit  ser- 

.  .  vices  in  gen- 

tOWnS.     He  will  find  in  them  very  few  important  ex-        erai. 

periments  in  this  direction,  and  will  conclude  that 
Great  Britain  and  Germany  are  the  fields  best  wor- 
thy his  attention.  But  if  the  French  towns  have  in 
these  regards  pursued  a  policy  less  bold  and  brilliant, 
it  is  nevertheless  true  that  their  methods  are  not 
without  useful  lessons  to  practical  administrators,  es- 
pecially to  those  of  American  cities.  The  French 
towns  are  all  very  compact, — that  is  to  say,  they  have 
a  dense  population  and  a  restricted  municipal  area. 
Their  street-railway  lines  accordingly  do  not  perform 
so  important  a  function  as  those  of  American  cities, 
which  serve  populations  spread  over  far  greater  street-ran- 
areas.  The  French  government  has,  however,  con-  wawu? 
sidered  the  subject  of  municipal  tramways  important 
enough  to  require  very  careful  legislation.  The  con- 
sequence is  that  the  street  railways  of  each  large 
French  town  constitute  a  rationally  planned  system. 
In  almost  every  case  it  has  been  deemed  best  to  grant 


188 


MUNICIPAL,  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Franchises 
scrutinized 
"by  higher 
authorities. 


Municipal 
income  from 
transit  lines. 


Marseilles 
tramways 
and  omni- 
buses. 


Tramlines 
of  Lyons. 


the  street-railway  franchises  of  a  town  to  one  com- 
pany, in  order  to  insure  coherence  and  uniformity  in 
methods,  to  secure  transfer  privileges,  and  to  focus 
responsibility.  The  laws  permit  the  municipal  coun- 
cils to  exercise  almost  entire  freedom  in  the  detailed 
character  of  the  franchises  they  confer,  but  the  ap- 
proval of  the  higher  authorities  is  requisite  in  every 
case,  and  many  precautions  are  taken  to  make  it 
certain  that  the  interests  of  the  municipal  treasury 
and  the  welfare  and  convenience  of  the  citizens  have 
been  at  no  point  sacrificed  for  the  benefit  of  a  private 
corporation.  Some  French  cities  obtain  a  percentage 
upon  gross  receipts,  others  receive  a  fixed  annual 
rental,  and  still  others  exact  a  capital  sum  for  the 
franchise,  and  agree  upon  a  certain  annual  payment 
for  each  car  in  use.  None  of  the  French  towns  are 
in  receipt  of  an  important  revenue  from  transit 
companies,  but  this  is  because  the  business  of  local 
transit  has  not  yet  grown  to  very  lucrative  dimen- 
sions. The  Marseilles  municipality  obtains  two  or 
three  per  cent,  of  the  gross  receipts  of  the  company 
which  operates  the  tramway  system.  In  Marseilles 
the  omnibus  lines  are  quite  as  important  as  those 
of  the  street-railway  company,  and  they  also  pay 
a  reasonable  compensation  to  the  treasury.  The 
rates  of  fare  on  the  street-cars  of  Marseilles  are  ex- 
ceedingly low;  and,  indeed,  it  is  through  low  fares 
rather  than  through  large  payments  to  the  municipal 
treasury  that  the  real  benefits  of  public  regulation 
accrue  to  the  inhabitants  of  all  the  principal  French 
towns.  Twenty-five  years  is  a  usual  franchise  period 
in  these  French  municipalities. 

The  general  omnibus  and  tram  company  of  Lyons, 
which  obtained  its  present  charter  in  1882,  pays  the 
municipality  eighty  thousand  francs  a  year  for  its 
privileges.  The  Lyons  cars  have  two  classes,  and  the 


THE  FKENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  189 

rate  of  fare  (in  American  money)  is  four  cents  for  a  CHAP.  n. 
first-class  seat,  and  two  cents  for  a  second-class  one, 
to  any  part  of  the  city.  The  same  company  which  Bordeaux 
operates  the  Lyons  system  owns  that  of  Bordeaux 
and  various  other  French  towns.  The  Bordeaux 
franchise  differs  from  that  of  Lyons  in  the  character 
of  the  money  payments  it  exacts,  the  principal  pay- 
ment taking  the  form  of  a  fixed  yearly  charge  for 
each  omnibus  or  street  car  in  active  service.  Bordeaux^ 
which  is  one  of  the  most  ancient  of  the  French  cities, 
and  which  possesses  architectural  monuments  of 
great  antiquity,  also  furnishes  a  striking  illustration 
of  the  new  in  juxtaposition  with  the  old.  In  the  heart 
of  the  town  there  remain  many  of  the  narrow  ancient  street  sys- 
streets,  and  the  inner  boulevard  lines  show  the  loca-  era!  progress. 
tion  of  the  ancient  walls.  The  city  lies  as  a  crescent 
upon  a  band  of  the  river  Garonne,  its  water-front 
somewhat  resembling  that  of  New  Orleans.  But  the 
modern  town  has  spread  far  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
ancient  city,  and  has  its  network  of  great  tree-lined 
boulevards  and  avenues  quite  upon  the  Parisian 
model.  In  1871  its  population  was  perhaps  one 
hundred  and  seventy-five  thousand.  In  1891  this  was 
more  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand,  and  Bor- 
deaux ranked  fourth  in  size  among  the  French  cities. 
The  largest  town  in  France  apart  from  Paris  is  Ly- 
ons, which  will  have  shown  by  the  census  of  1896  a 
population  of  approximately  four  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  souls,  within  a  municipal  area  of  4300  hec- 
tares,—  about  seventeen  square  miles.  At  the  open- 
ing of  the  century  the  inhabitants  of  Lyons  were  only 
a  little  more  than  one  hundred  thousand.  At  the  time 
of  its  modernization,  beginning  in  about  1855,  it  had 
a  population  exceeding  two  hundred  thousand.  This 
had  grown  in  1881  to  377,000,  and  in  1891  to  416,000; 
and  if  the  immediately  suburban  population  belonging 


190 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Congestion 

of  the  old 

Lyons. 


Ten-story 
tenement 
bouses. 


The  modern 
quarters. 


Reforming 

the  inner 

city. 


to  Lyons  as  a  general  center  were  added,  its  present 
population  would  considerably  exceed  five  hundred 
thousand. 

Compressed  as  its  municipal  limits  would  seem  to 
be,  the  nominal  area  affords  no  true  conception  of 
the  painful  density  of  the  Lyons  population.  The  old 
city  lay  at  the  confluence  of  the  Rhone  and  the  Saone, 
where  the  two  rivers  hemmed  the  town  in  upon  the 
point  of  a  narrow  peninsula.  Artificial  fortifications 
supplemented  the  natural  water  defenses,  and  the  an- 
cient city  had  no  opportunity  to  grow  laterally,  and 
therefore  it  developed  vertically.  Its  narrow,  wind- 
ing passageways  were  flanked  by  tenement-houses  of 
eight  or  ten  stories  in  height,  with  not  a  few  that  were 
of  still  greater  altitude.  The  congestion  was  dreadful, 
air  and  sunlight  had  only  limited  access,  epidemics 
were  never  wholly  absent,  and  the  rate  of  mortality 
was  frightfully  high.  Under  the  modern  reform  era, 
there  has  arisen  a  great  new  quarter  in  the  east,  across 
the  Rhone  from  the  ancient  peninsula ;  and  this  new 
town  is  laid  out  with  broad  modern  streets  crossing 
each  other  at  right  angles,  with  a  few  diagonal  boule- 
vards and  avenues  to  perfect  the  system  of  main  thor- 
oughfares. In  like  manner  the  attractive  hills  on  the 
west  beyond  the  Sa6ne  have  been  made  a  part  of  the 
city ;  and  in  the  north,  where  the  outward  curves  of 
the  two  rivers  gradually  widen  the  peninsula,  there  is 
a  further  development  of  the  modern  city.  Mean- 
while, since  1855,  there  has  proceeded  the  difficult  task 
of  modernizing  the  ancient  quarters,  plowing  the  di- 
rect lines  of  a  main  street  system  through  the  laby- 
rinth, and  introducing  sanitary  reforms  into  the  con- 
gested districts.  The  ancient  wedge  is  now  connected 
at  numerous  points  with  the  new  quarters  east  of  the 
Rhdne  and  west  of  the  Saone  by  handsome  bridges, 
while  both  streams  are  bordered  for  a  long  distance 
with  magnificent  broad  and  tree-lined  quays. 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  191 

Thus  the  second  city  of  France  is  by  no  means  to     CHAP.  n. 
be  despised  as  an  instance  of  urban  modernization. 
The  recent  civic  edifices  are  numerous  and  of  striking    HC  works. 
architectural  merit.     In  its  ancient  days  Lyons  was 
supplied  with  water  by  three  great  Roman  aqueducts, 
one  of  which  is  said  to  have  been  more  than  fifty  miles 
long.     The  present  supply  is  pumped  from  the  river 
Rhone  at  a  point  some  distance  above  the  city,  and 
forced  by  steam-power  into  reservoirs  which  are  several 
hundred  feet  higher  than  the  level  of  the  central  area,     drainage. 
Modern  fastidiousness  in  sanitary  matters  has  led  to 
measures  for  the  filtration  of  the  water  supply  and 
for  the  improvement  of  the  drainage   system, —  al- 
though there  will  long  remain  a  field  for  energetic 
effort  in  the  sphere  of  sanitary  ameliorations. 

The  chief  French  provincial  towns,  if  one  may  gen- 
eralize sweepingly,  have  indeed  much  more  to  show  outward  ag- 

*       °  J  '  grandize- 

the  visitor  who  is  attracted  by  imposing  boulevards,      ment  of 
by  elegance  in  public  architecture,  by  well-kept  parks      towns, 
and  squares,  by  interesting  and  artistic  monuments, 
and  by  the  other  externals  of  municipal  aggrandize- 
ment, than  they  can  reveal  to  the  inquirer  who  cares 
most  for  the  achievements  of  sanitary  science  and  for 
kindred  social  services.     In  this  regard  they  have 
much  to  learn  from  the  large  British  towns,  which, 
while  less  attractive  in  many  of  their  external  appoint-    forms  pro- 
ments,  have  as  a  rule  accomplished  far  better  results      tardily. 
in  the  provision  of  pure  water  and  wholesome  drain- 
age, in  housing  reforms,  and  in  aggressive  sanitary  and 
social  administration  along  various  lines. 

Marseilles,  the  greatest  of  the  French  seaports,  and 
the  French  town  which  ranks  next  to  Lyons  in  size  Marseilles— 
and  importance,  has  held  a  most  unenviable  place    conditions. 
among  the  great  towns  of  Europe  as  regards  its  health 
conditions.   It  has  suffered  from  scourge  after  scourge 
of  cholera,  smallpox,  typhoid  fever,  and  the  infectious 
diseases  that  are  especially  fatal  to  children.    Its  aver- 


192 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


Crowded 
slums  and 
bad  sewers. 


An  improv- 
ing outlook. 


Growth  of 
population. 


Area  and 
main  thor- 
oughfares. 


Work  of 
local  reform- 
ers. 


age  death-rate  through  the  past  thirty  years  has  been 
higher  than  that  of  almost  any  other  large  town  in  the 
world  with  which  comparison  could  reasonably  be 
made.  Its  location  as  a  cosmopolitan  Mediterranean 
port  has  had  something  to  do  with  the  prevalence  of 
infectious  diseases,  but  the  fault  has  rested  chiefly 
with  its  lack  of  a  proper  system  of  sewers,  its  unre- 
formed  and  densely  populated  ancient  slums,  and  its 
tardiness  in  the  adoption  and  energetic  enforcement 
of  modern  sanitary  administrative  methods.  The  past 
three  or  four  years  have  witnessed  decidedly  hopeful 
improvements  in  Marseilles,  and  its  thorough  sanitary 
regeneration  may  now  be  deemed  a  question  of  only 
a  few  years  more.  Its  commercial  prosperity  has  been 
enhanced  of  late  by  the  joint  efforts  of  the  municipal 
authorities,  the  national  government,  and  the  local 
Chamber  of  Commerce,  which  is  a  semi-official  and 
governmental  institution.  Its  harbor  facilities  have 
been  greatly  improved,  and  an  act  of  1893  authorizes 
the  further  expenditure  of  twenty  million  francs  for 
harbor  works.  Its  population  in  the  year  1801  was 
111,000.  This  had  grown  to  more  than  four  hundred 
thousand  when  the  census  of  1891  was  taken,  and  the 
commercial  and  industrial  prosperity  of  the  town  in- 
sures a  steady  growth  for  years  to  come. 

The  existing  area,  which  comprises  22,801  hectares, 
is  traversed  by  numerous  boulevards  of  very  imposing 
character,  with  the  Parisian  adjuncts  of  shade-trees, 
good  pavements,  and  effective  cleansing  services.  The 
network  of  lesser  streets  has  not  hitherto  been  so  for- 
tunate in  these  circumstances  of  paving  and  cleans- 
ing. But  Marseilles  has  for  some  years  had  its  group 
of  brilliant  and  enlightened  municipal  reformers,  who 
have  unsparingly  cited,  for  the  awakening  of  their 
fellow  citizens,  the  best  results  achieved  in  other 
towns,  not  only  those  of  France  but  also  those  of  Ger- 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM 


193 


many,  Belgium,  Italy,  England,  and  even  of  America. 
The  consequences  have  been  gratifying.  Since  1890 
the  death-rate  has  shown  a  declining  tendency,  which 
it  is  hoped  will  not  be  followed  by  any  reaction. 
Thus  the  rate  of  deaths  for  1894  was  28  per  1000  of 
population,  and  the  average  rate  for  the  five  years, 
1890-4,  was  about  30 ;  while  for  the  corresponding 
period  ten  years  earlier  the  rate  was  approximately  34. 

Sanitary  improvements,  if  carried  out  to  the  full 
measure  of  the  programmes  urged  by  the  local  lead- 
ers of  municipal  progress  and  renovation,  would 
promptly  reduce  the  death-rate  to  25,  and,  in  a  very 
few  years,  to  20,  which  was  the  Paris  rate  for  1894. 
When  sanitary  arrangements  at  Paris  were  far  less 
perfect  than  they  are  to-day,  the  death-rate  was  forty 
or  fifty  per  cent,  higher  than  now,  and  the  deaths  out- 
numbered the  births.  But  although  the  Paris  birth- 
rate (nearly  twenty-five  per  1000  in  1894)  is  a  very 
low  one  when  compared  with  that  of  European  cities 
outside  of  France,  it  has  now  risen  somewhat,  while 
the  death-rate  has  steadily  declined,  and  the  popula- 
tion begins  to  show  a  slight  net  increase,  apart  from 
the  influx  of  non-Parisians. 

But  speaking  in  general  of  the  French  towns,  the 
sad  fact  remains  that  their  deaths  every  year  exceed 
their  births.  Thus  in  Marseilles  the  deaths  for  1894 
were  11,633,  and  the  births  only  11,284.  In  Lyons,  the 
year  being  unusually  favorable  to  health,  there  were 
9020  deaths  and  8333  births.  The  difference  in  Lyons 
has  been  much  greater  in  most  years.  Thus  in  1890 
the  deaths  were  9832  and  the  births  only  8101.  Aver- 
aging a  number  of  consecutive  years,  the  deaths  in 
Lyons  have  been  from  fifteen  per  cent,  to  twenty  per 
cent,  more  numerous  than  the  births.  I  am  optimis- 
tic enough  to  believe  that  a  balance  will  have  been 
reached  at  Lyons  and  Marseilles,  and,  indeed,  that 


CHAP.  II. 


Death-rate 

statistics. 


Compared 
with  the 
Paris  death- 
rate 


Births  and 

deaths  in 

Paris. 


Excess  of 
deaths  in 
Marseilles 
and  Lyons. 


Evidences  of 

a  change  for 

the  better. 


13 


194 


CHAP.  II. 


Bordeaux. 


Births  and 

deaths  at 

Lille. 


Toulouse  — 
a  bad  record. 


Comparison 
with  a  Ger- 
man town. 


there  will  have  been  a  final  turn  in  the  scales,  by  the 
year  1900.  The  mortality  of  infants  under  one  year 
old  has  begun  to  show  a  marked  decline,  and  in  vari- 
ous ways  the  results  of  an  improving  sanitary  regime 
are  making  themselves  apparent.  In  Bordeaux,  where 
the  deaths  have  usually  been  from  five  to  fifteen  per 
cent,  more  numerous  than  the  births,  the  year  1894 
showed  a  slight  excess  of  births, — somewhat  less  than 
one  per  cent.  As  for  Lille,  the  next  town  in  size,  the 
balance  has  been  upon  the  right  side  for  some  years, 
and  it  tends  to  increase  in  a  satisfactory  manner. 
The  birth-rate  regularly  exceeds  thirty  per  1000,  and 
in  1894  the  death-rate  fell  from  its  former  average  of 
twenty-five  or  twenty-six  to  less  than  twenty-two ;  so 
that  the  natural  increase  for  the  year  was  about  two 
thousand,  in  a  population  of  200,000.  Toulouse  has 
for  a  number  of  years  presented  the  dismal  spectacle 
of  a  town  with  a  birth-rate  of  about  nineteen  and  a 
death-rate  of  about  twenty-six.  In  1890  there  were 
2592  births  and  4119  deaths ;  and  740  of  the  deaths 
were  of  children  less  than  one  year  old.  In  1894 
there  were  2879  births  and  3780  deaths,  with  498 
deaths  of  young  infants. 

The  situation  improves,  but  its  unfortunate  charac- 
ter can  scarcely  be  comprehended  from  these  sum- 
mary figures  except  by  those  accustomed  to  draw 
inferences  from  comparative  vital  statistics.  The  Ger- 
man town  of  Elberfeld  is  similar  to  Toulouse  in  popu- 
lation, though  a  little  smaller.  The  Elberfeld  records 
for  1894  show  4555  births,  and  2181  deaths,  including 
650  deaths  of  infants  (less  than  one  year  old).  The 
large  number  of  infant  deaths  in  the  German  town 
must  be  compared  with  the  high  birth-rate.  All  the 
German  and  English  towns  are  gaining  population 
rapidly  by  the  maintenance  of  a  high  birth-rate  side 
by  side  with  improvements  in  health  conditions  which 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


195 


have  greatly  lowered  the  death-rate.  Thus  in  1894 
Leeds  and  Sheffield,  never  in  times  past  very  famous 
as  health  resorts,  had  respectively  6927  and  5994 
deaths,  and  12,502  and  11,267  births.  The  infant 
deaths  were  1940  and  1766.  Sheffield  had  as  many 
births  as  Marseilles  and  only  half  as  many  deaths,  its 
population  being  ten  or  fifteen  per  cent,  smaller.  Leeds, 
also  smaller  than  Marseilles,  had  1200  more  births 
and  4700  less  deaths.  Frankfort-on-the-Main  is  some- 
what like  the  French  cities  in  the  fact  of  having  a  low 
birth-rate,  and  the  same  remark  applies  to  Stuttgart. 
But  these  two  German  cities  have  of  late  succeeded  in 
reducing  their  death-rates  to  seventeen  or  eighteen  per 
1000,  while  their  birth-rates  remain  at  from  twenty-six 
to  twenty-eight.  And  it  is  for  the  French  towns  to  fol- 
low the  sanitary  policies  that  have  been  so  remarkably 
successful  in  reducing  the  death-rate  of  Frankfort  and 
Stuttgart.  Strassburg  and  Metz,  in  the  ceded  strip, 
retain  the  French  characteristic  of  a  low  birth-rate, 
almost  evenly  balanced  by  a  death-rate  of  twenty-three 
or  thereabouts.  In  St.  Etienne,  Nantes,  Le  Havre, 
Roubaix,  Rouen,  and  other  smaller  French  towns,  the 
average  figures  of  births  and  deaths  now  nearly  offset 
each^other,  local  circumstances  differing  considerably 
however,  since  for  example  the  births  were  strongly 
in  excess  in  Roubaix  in  1894,  while  the  deaths  heavily 
preponderated  in  Rouen.  The  total  balance  for  all  the 
important  towns  of  France  has  hitherto  remained  upon 
the  unfavorable  side,  with  that  balance  steadily  di- 
minishing, and  now  approaching  the  vanishing  point. 
By  the  census  of  1881  there  were  found  to  be  forty- 
seven  towns  in  France  which  had  more  than  30,000 
inhabitants  each.  This  number  had  increased  to  fifty- 
six  in  1891,  while  only  232  of  the  more  than  36,000 
communes  had  a  population  exceeding  10,000.  The 
sixth  in  size  of  the  French  cities  is  Toulouse,  with 


CHAP.  II. 


Leeds  and 

Sheffield 

compared 

with  French 

towns. 


Frankfort 
and  Stutt- 
gart as  in- 
stances of 
sanitary 
progress. 


Strassburg 
and  Metz. 


Roubaix 
Rouen,  and 
other  towns. 


Some  popu- 
lation fig- 
ures. 


196  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

v 

CHAP.  ii.  nearly  150,000  people  in  1891,  and  the  next  is  St. 
Etienne.  The  other  towns  having  more  than  100,000 
by  that  census  were  Nantes,  Le  Havre,  Roubaix, 
Rouen,  and  Rheims.  The  list  of  towns  having  a  popu- 
lation ranging  from  30,000  to  100,000  comprises  many 
places  of  great  historical  fame  and  of  interesting  local 
characteristics.  As  a  rule,  these  French  towns  were 
walled  in  the  old  days,  and  the  comparatively  recent 

boulevards,  removal  of  the  fortifications  has  resulted  in  encircling 
boulevards  and  has  given  the  towns  their  most  note- 
worthy physical  features. 

This  description  applies  notably  to  Toulouse,  one  of 
the  most  ancient  of  French  cities,  the  capital  of  old 
Languedoc.  Its  congestion  as  a  walled  city  has  left  a 
legacy  of  unwholesome  conditions  that  it  will  require 

Toulouse,  a  long  time  to  reform.  Handsome  boulevards  replace 
the  walls,  and  a  few  new  streets  have  within  twenty 
years  been  cut  through  the  close  tangle  of  the  inner 
city  5  but  this  task  of  inner  reconstruction  has  made 
only  slow  advances.  In  the  newer  zone,  however,  out- 
side the  former  wall  of  cincture,  the  town  is  modern 
in  its  plan.  Its  swift  river,  the  Garonne,  furnishes  a 
water-supply  that  is  fairly  good  by  reason  of  a  system 
of  natural  nitration,  and  also  suffices  to  carry  off  the 
drainage.  I  have  spoken  of  the  high  death-rate  at 
Toulouse;  and  the  vicious  condition  of  the  ancient 
tenements  surviving  in  the  heart  of  the  town  suffi- 
ciently accounts  for  it.  Such  sanitary  and  street  im- 
provements as  the  municipality  has  ventured  to  make 
have  been  promptly  rewarded,  as  the  vital  statistics 
have  duly  testified. 

The  visitor  who  enters  France  at  Le  Havre  almost 
invariably  makes  haste  to  reach  Paris,  unmindful  of 
the  two  excellent  representatives  of  the  French  pro- 
vincial city  which  lie  in  the  valley  of  the  Seine  be- 
tween Paris  and  the  sea.  Le  Havre  itself  ranks  next 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  197 

to  Marseilles  in  importance  as  a  French  seaport,  and  CHAP.  n. 
although  it  was  once  a  walled  and  fortified  place,  it 
has  been  recast  upon  thoroughly  modern  lines  and 
possesses  handsome  streets  with  the  full  complement 
of  improvements  that  modern  municipal  energy  is 
demanding  everywhere.  The  development  of  the  har- 
bor facilities,  constantly  progressing,  is  the  most  im- 
portant and  creditable  of  the  public  works  with  which 
the  municipality  has  concerned  itself. 

Rouen,  which  is  perhaps  eighty  miles  from  Le 
Havre  by  the  course  of  the  Seine,  and  fifty-five  miles 
by  rail,  is  also  an  important  seaport  by  virtue  of  the 
great  depth  of  the  Seine  estuary,  whose  tidal  move-  The  meta- 
ment  extends  even  beyond  Rouen.  This  city  of  an-  moik>uen.s  ° 
cient  fame,  the  capital  of  old  Normandy,  typifies  as 
completely  as  any  other  town  in  France  outside  of 
Paris  the  modern  processes  of  reconstruction  which 
characterized  the  Second  Empire,  and  which  were  at 
the  height  of  their  activity  in  the  period  from  1860 
to  1870.  The  historic  walls  of  Rouen  may  be  perfectly 
traced  in  the  line  of  broad  boulevards  which  form  an 
irregular  ellipse  around  the  inner  city.  In  scarcely 
any  other  French  town  has  the  plan  of  a  modern  sys- 
tem of  main  thoroughfares  inside  the  ancient  limits 
been  so  completely  carried  into  execution  as  in  Rouen ; 

,  , ,  .   J,.         „   ,        ,  .,,  .    .    ,        '    A  miniature 

and  the  town  might  well  be  described  as  a  miniature  Pans, 
edition  of  Paris.  The  reminders  of  Paris  are,  in- 
deed, very  numerous.  For  example,  at  Rouen,  as  at 
Paris,  the  river  Seine  has  been  flanked  by  miles  of 
magnificent  stone  quays  on  both  banks,  and  the  river 
as  thus  compressed  keeps  its  own  channel  deep  and 
clear.  Eventually  Rouen  will  annex  its  thriving  sub- 
urbs, and  it  will  thus  gain  rank  with  the  towns  of 
approximately  200,000  people. 

A  traveler  who  touches  French  soil  at  Calais  may 
readily  visit  the  stirring  and  historic  town  of  Lille, 

13' 


198 


CHAP.  II. 


The  indus- 
trial town  of 
Roubaix. 


Rapid  ex- 
pansion. 


Modernized 
Amiens. 


The  new 

town  of  St. 

Etienne. 


of  which  I  have  already  said  something ;  and  while  at 
Lille  he  should  also  visit  Roubaix,  in  the  immediate 
vicinity.  Roubaix  is  famous  as  the  center  of  the 
French  woolen  industry,  as  Rouen  is  the  center  of 
cotton  manufacture.  It  is  true  of  Roubaix  as  of 
Rouen  that  the  census  does  not  give  credit  for  the 
full  population  that  belongs  to  the  place  as  a  com- 
mercial town.  The  census  of  1891  ascribes  to  Le 
Havre  116,000,  to  Roubaix  115,000,  and  to  Rouen 
112,000;  but  on  the  very  outskirts  of  Roubaix  is 
Tourcoing  with  a  population  of  more  than  65,000, 
and  there  are  other  populous  manufacturing  towns  in 
the  immediate  vicinity.  Thus  Roubaix  stands  at  the 
center  of  an  urban  population  of  perhaps  250,000, 
where  at  the  opening  of  the  century  there  were  hardly 
10,000  people  living.  Here  we  find,  therefore,  a  man- 
ufacturing community  which  has  developed  in  a  man- 
ner comparable  with  those  of  the  north  of  England. 

Roubaix  forms  an  exception  to  the  rule  of  old  for- 
tified towns,  whose  modern  street  systems  take  their 
key  from  boulevards  following  the  lines  of  obliterated 
walls  and  moats.  But  in  resuming  the  journey  to 
Paris  one  passes  Amiens,  the  capital  of  the  ancient 
province  of  Picardy, — a  place  well  worth  study  for 
what  it  reveals  of  the  process  by  which  an  ancient 
walled  city  may  be  turned  into  a  modern  boulevarded 
town.  St.  Etienne,  like  Roubaix,  is  a  specimen  of  the 
modern  manufacturing  town  which  has  sprung  up 
rapidly  in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  has  no  historical 
background.  Its  street  system  is  strikingly  different 
from  those  of  most  other  French  towns,  for  the  sim- 
ple reason  that  it  was  never  a  walled  city,  and  its 
ground-plan,  therefore,  lacks  the  usual  tendency  to- 
ward concentrics  and  radials.  St.  Etienne  is  regarded 
as  having  grown  more  rapidly  in  the  last  half -century 
than  any  other  French  town.  It  is  in  the  heart  of  the 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM  199 

best  coal  region,  not  far  from  Lyons,  and  is  the     CHAP.  n. 
French  center  for  iron  and  steel  manufactures  and 
the  great  metal- working  industries, —  a  Sheffield  or  a 
Pittsburg. 

Not  only  is  the  framework  of  municipal  govern- 
ment identical  for  all  these  French  towns  under  the 
terms  of  the  general  municipal  code  which  I  have  al- 
ready described,  but  very  many  of  the  active  func-  uniform 

,.        J       „      ..  •    •       i  4J  •*  methods  and 

tions  of  the  municipal  corporations  are  uniform  functions. 
throughout  the  towns,  because  they  are  exercised  in 
conformity  with  the  requirements  of  general  laws. 
Thus  the  educational  system,  while  largely  in  the 
hands  of  the  municipal  authorities  as  a  branch  of 
local  administration,  is  strictly  regulated  by  national 
enactments.  Throughout  France  primary  instruction 
is  obligatory  and  free.  School-books  and  various  ap-  ofeducatio™. 
pliances  needful  in  schools  are  gratuitously  supplied. 
Since  1886  the  public  schools  have  been  entirely  in 
charge  of  lay  teachers.  The  caisses  des  ecoles,  which  I 
have  described  in  my  account  of  educational  work  in 
Paris,  are  found  in  connection  with  schools  through- 
out the  whole  of  France,  and  have  everywhere  the 
same  characteristics.  They  possess  full  authority  of 
law,  yet  leave  large  room  for  voluntary  action.  In 
Marseilles,  Lyons,  and  the  other  large  towns,  no  less 
than  in  Paris,  the  caisse  des  ecoles  looks  after  the 
health  and  comfort  of  the  children,  supplies  warm 
meals  from  school  restaurants,  gives  shoes  and  clothes 
to  the  needy,  organizes  vacation  holiday  trips,  pro- 
vides prizes  for  faithfulness  and  merit,  and  in  a  score 
of  ways  enhances  the  value  of  school  life  and  work, 
and  promotes  the  wholesome  development  of  the  rising 
generation.  The  system  of  ecoles  maternelles,  under 

&  J  '  Kindergar- 

which    free    instruction    is    given   by  kindergarten       tens. 
methods  to  the  children  below  six  years  of  age,  also 
prevails  in  all  the  French  towns  as  well  as  in  Paris. 


200  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.  Those  features  of  the  law  which  make  instruction 
compulsory  between  the  ages  of  six  and  thirteen  are 

Compulsory 

instruction,  remarkably  well  enforced ;  and  particularly  since  1890 
the  number  of  French  children  growing  up  without 
instruction  is  too  small  to  be  reckoned.  It  would  at 
most  constitute  less  than  one  per  cent. 

The  standards  of  education,  from  the  ecole  mater- 

nelle  up  to  the  university,  are  fixed  for  the  whole  coun- 

Nationai     try  by  the  central  educational  authorities,  under  the 

control  of  .  ..  a        i  i*     • 

education,  general  oversight  of  the  minister  of  public  instruction. 
The  normal  schools,  which  instruct  the  teachers,  are 
jointly  national  and  departmental,  and  the  examina- 
tion of  all  teachers  is  conducted  under  the  auspices 
of  the  higher  authorities.  Thus  the  criteria  of  excel- 
lence are  uniform  throughout  France,  and  the  great 
army  of  teachers,  men  and  women,  constitute  a  branch 

Teachers  be-  ^  7 

long  to  the  of  the  national  civil  service.  Teachers'  salaries  are 
service,  regulated  on  a  scale  prescribed  by  the  national  gov- 
ernment. The  employment  and  assignment  of  teach- 
ers belongs  to  the  departmental  school  authorities, 
with  the  prefect  in  general  control.  Appointments  are 
made  in  a  businesslike  fashion  from  the  departmental 
lists  of  applicants  who  have  passed  the  examinations 
and  have  been  duly  certificated  and  registered. 

The  municipal  school  board  is  presided  over  by  the 
Municipal  mayor,  and  most  of  its  members  are  designated  by  the 
boards,  city  council, —  usually,  though  not  necessarily,  from 
its  own  membership.  The  board  also  contains,  how- 
ever, one  or  more  of  the  school  inspectors,  who  are  the 
appointed  representatives  of  the  higher  educational 
machinery  of  the  nation.  French  school  legislation 
since  1880  has  been  not  merely  voluminous  but  also 
of  the  most  intelligent  and  valuable  character.  It  has 
forced  good  methods  into  the  remotest  hamlets,  has 
made  it  obligatory  upon  the  municipalities  and  com- 
munes to  provide  suitable  buildings,  and  has  given 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  201 

universality  to  those  attractive  side-features  of  school     CHAP.  IL 
life  which  I  have  endeavored  to  describe  in  my  ac- 
count of  the  schools  of  Paris.     In  particular,  it  has     spirit  of 

...  school  life 

endeavored  to  promote  every  phase  of  practical  in-  and  work, 
struction  for  the  development  of  health  and  physique 
and  the  skilful  use  of  eye  and  hand,  and  has  made  it 
the  duty  of  the  schools  to  teach  the  principles  of  mo- 
rality, industry,  and  thrift,  and  of  household  and  busi- 
ness economics,  together  with  the  keenest  type  of 
French  patriotism. 

For  the  larger  towns,  the  general  government  has 
been  ready  to  subsidize  apprentice  schools  and  practi- 
cal trade  and  technical  institutions,  while  the  munici-     Technical 
pal  councils  themselves  have  shown  a  commendable  aeducatlon? 
zeal  in  this  direction.     At  Lille,  for  example,  there 
has  lately  been  completed  a  magnificent  institution 
for  the  training  of  young  men  who  are  to  supply  the 
knowledge  and  skill  that  the  great  textile  and  chemi- 
cal industries  of  the  north  of  France  will  require.   At 
St.  Etienne,  the  technical  instruction  naturally  gives 

.    ,  '  .    .  .  .  3  A  Municipal 

special  emphasis  to  mining  engineering  and  the  pro-  trade  schools 

.  .  ,  , -,,  -n  inallindus- 

cesses  of  metal- working.  At  Marseilles  and  some  other  trial  centers. 
southern  centers,  the  ceramic  arts,  with  other  lines  of 
manufacture,  are  especially  provided  for  in  the  techni- 
cal schools.  In  all  the  important  towns,  moreover, 
one  finds  schools  of  the  fine  arts  and  of  artistic  de- 
signing, supported  by  the  municipalities  and  subsi- 
dized by  the  general  government,  while  commercial 
schools,  in  like  manner  supported  as  public  institu- 
tions, are  found  in  every  town  of  importance. 

The  organization  of  assistance  publique  throughout 
France  employs  precisely  the  same  principles  and 
methods  which  I  have  set  forth  as  in  operation  in  the  Poor  relief, 
department  of  the  Seine.  Each  of  the  other  depart- 
ments of  France  has  its  general  task  of  supervision, 
while  the  municipalities  and  smaller  communes  in  turn 


202  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ii.  possess  their  local  boards  of  assistance  publique  and 
their  bureaux  de  bienfaisance.  There  are  in  France  from 
15,000  to  16,000  of  these  bureaux  de  bienfaisance,  car- 
rying on  their  work  in  a  manner  quite  in  keeping  with 
that  which  I  have  described  as  pertaining  to  the  twenty 
bureaus  in  the  Paris  arrondissements.  The  mayor 
is  at  the  head  of  the  municipal  bureau,  unless  he  may 

Organization  A 

of  bureaux    have  designated  one  of  his  adjuncts  to  represent  him 

de  bienfai-  .  .    .       i  .,  . 

sance.  in  that  capacity.  The  municipal  council  is  represented 
by  two  or  three  members  which  it  designates;  and 
several  other  members,  usually  four,  are  selected  for 
four-year  terms  (one  going  out  each  year)  by  the  pre- 
fect of  the  department,  either  from  the  municipal 
council,  from  other  official  or  professional  quarters, 
or  from  the  non-official  citizens  who  are  interested  in 
public  charity.  About  these  official  bureaux  de  bien- 
faisance as  charity-centers  one  finds  that  most  of  the 
volunteer  work  of  poor  relief  has  learned  to  rally,  for 
the  advantages  of  union  and  concentration.  Many 
thousands  of  volunteer  helpers,  like  the  commissaires 
and  dames  de  charite  of  Paris,  whose  work  I  have 
described,  are  found  aiding  the  provincial  bureaux  de 
bienfaisance.  As  for  the  care  of  the  insane,  the  main- 
tenance of  establishments  for  the  blind  and  for  deaf- 

^charities*.'  mutes,  the  administration  of  the  laws  relating  to  the 
succor  and  care  of  unfortunate  children, —  these  mat- 
ters, as  well  as  the  system  of  penal  institutions,  belong 
to  the  administration  of  the  respective  departments 
rather  than  to  the  municipal  governments. 

The  public  pawnshop  (mont-de-piete)  is  a  munici- 
pal institution  which  exists  in  more  than  forty  of  the 

The  munici-  chief  provincial  cities  and  towns  of  France.  The  mont- 
de-piete  is  carried  on  under  the  control  of  a  board  or 
commission,  over  which  the  mayor  always  presides. 
The  other  members  of  the  board  are  selected  in  three 
equal  parts  from  (1)  the  members  of  the  municipal 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


203 


Municipal 
savings- 
banks. 


council,  (2)  the  administrators  of  charitable  institu-  CHAP.  n. 
tions,  and  (3)  the  other  citizens  of  the  town.  The 
benefits  of  these  institutions  in  Lyons,  Bordeaux,  Mar- 
seilles, Lille,  Rouen,  and  other  populous  industrial 
towns,  are  not  one  whit  less  than  those  conferred 
upon  the  working-people  of  Paris  by  the  great  metro- 
politan mont-de-piete  system  which  I  have  described 
in  the  previous  chapter. 

Much  more  universal  throughout  France  than  the 
monts-de-piete  are  the  caisses  d'epargne,  or  savings- 
banks.  These  are  to  be  found  in  all  the  important 
towns,  without  exception.  At  the  opening  of  1894 
there  were  543  municipal  and  local  savings-banks,  with 
branches  and  receiving  offices  which  increased  the 
total  number  of  places  where  savings  might  be  de- 
posited to  somewhat  more  than  two  thousand.  In  very 
many  instances  one  finds  the  savings-bank  itself  lo- 
cated in  an  important  town,  with  its  branch  offices  in 
outlying  villages  for  the  convenience  of  depositors. 
The  development  of  the  savings-bank  system,  under 
the  joint  auspices  of  the  municipal  governments  and 
local  societies  of  public-spirited  citizens,  must  be 
deemed  one  of  the  most  significant  and  important  Remarkable 
phases  of  social  progress  that  can  be  observed  in  thTsystem. 
France.  Taking  the  entire  population  of  the  country, 
one  finds  that  for  the  year  1893  there  were  6,173,000 
depositors  in  these  municipal  savings-banks,  or  161 
for  every  1000  of  the  population.  Thus  for  every  siixr 
men,  women,  and  children  in  France  there  is  a  muni- 
cipal savings-bank  account,  the  average  value  of  which 
exceeds  500  francs.  The  total  yearly  deposits  in  these 
banks  is  now,  in  round  figures,  1,000,000,000  francs, 
while  the  accumulation  of  deposits  at  any  given  mo- 
ment is  considerably  in  excess  of  3,000,000,000  francs. 
I  have  not  included  in  these  statistics  the  figures  that  The  postal 
belong  to  the  national  postal  savings-bank  system,  "blnlS 


204 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  II. 


A  bank  ac- 
count for 
every  family 
in  France. 


Investment 
in  state  obli- 
gations. 


Analysis  of 
depositors. 


Municipal 
revenues. 


which, — though  much  younger  and  less  important 
than  the  municipal  savings-banks, —  is  showing  a 
rapid  development.  Thus  in  1893  the  national  postal 
system  was  patronized  by  2,327,000  depositors,  who 
confided  to  it  more  than  335,000,000  francs  of  their 
savings. 

Summing  up  the  two  systems,  therefore,  one  finds  a 
savings-bank  account  for  every  four  and  a  half  peo- 
ple, or  to  speak  in  a  general  way,  one  for  every  family. 
The  national  postal  savings-bank  system  was  begun 
in  1882,  and  so  rapid  has  been  its  progress  that  at  the 
end  of  1894  it  could  show  about  2,500,000  depositors. 
As  for  the  municipal  system,  the  number  of  depositors 
has  multiplied  threefold  in  twenty  years.  The  sav- 
ings-banks are  prudently  managed  under  national 
surveillance,  and  the  local  commissions  which  super- 
vise their  operations  are  composed  of  citizens  who 
serve  without  pay.  The  funds  are  almost  entirely  in- 
vested in  the  obligations  of  the  state ;  and  thus  the 
savings-bank  systems  are  a  powerful  supporter  of  the 
national  credit,  and  their  existence  and  remarkable 
popular  success  help  to  explain  in  part  the  ease  with 
which  the  governmental  financiers  have  been  able  to 
manage  an  immense  interest-bearing  debt.  An  analy- 
sis of  the  depositors  shows  that  the  vast  majority  be- 
long to  the  laboring  and  industrial  classes.  The  small 
shopkeepers  form  a  considerable  element,  and  the  con- 
tingent of  minors  of  both  sexes  is  exceedingly  large. 
Numerous  as  are  the  savings-bank  patrons  in  Paris, 
the  number  is  still  greater  proportionally  among  the 
working-people  of  Lyons,  Marseilles,  Bordeaux,  St. 
Etienne,  Orleans,  and  many  other  industrial  centers. 

The  French  municipal  treasuries  derive  their  in- 
comes from  two  principal  sources.  One  of  these  is  the 
system  of  direct  taxes,  the  other  is  the  octroi,  or  local 
customs  system.  The  direct  taxes  collected  for  local 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM  205 

purposes  are  levied  by  means  of  so-called  centimes  ad-     CHAP.  n. 
ditionnels.    To  understand  the  levy  of  these  centimes 
additionnels  it  is  necessary  to  glance  for  a  moment 
at  the  French  system  of  direct  taxes.     This  system  is 
one  of  long  standing,  and  it  has  become  fixed  in  the 

c  The  direct 

habits  of  the  nation.  There  are  several  important  taxes, 
direct  taxes.  The  first  of  these  is  the  contribution 
fonciere,  a  tax  levied  on  the  value  of  land  and  build- 
ings, the  building  improvements  being  assessed  sep- 
arately from  the  land.  Another  is  levied  upon  all 
house-occupiers,  based  upon  the  amount  of  rent  they 
pay,  with  extra  levies  for  each  servant  kept.  Still 
another  takes  the  form  of  an  elaborate,  graduated 
series  of  taxes  upon  business  callings  of  various  kinds, 
and  may  be  considered  an  annual  trade-license  sys- 
tem. These  schemes  of  direct  taxation  exist  primarily 
for  the  benefit  of  the  national  treasury.  The  rates  of 
levy  are  fixed  from  year  to  year  in  the  national  budget, 
and  the  amount  to  be  collected  by  means  of  each  of 
the  different  direct  taxes  is  determined.  Apportion- 
ment is  made  by  the  national  authorities  to  the  eighty- 
seven  departments.  The  departmental  authorities,  in  tionment. 
turn,  apportion  the  sums  to  be  raised  among  the  ar- 
rondissements.  The  arrondissement  councils  proceed 
to  distribute  the  burden  to  the  communes,  great  and 
small. 

The  taxes  thus  falling  upon  real  estate,  upon  house- 
holders, and  upon  business  pursuits  are  heavy  enough 
to  make  it  seem  practically  out  of  the  question  to  raise 
the  sum  total  of  local  revenues  by  assessments  of  the 
same  nature.  Nevertheless,  it  is  found  convenient  to 
provide  a  considerable  part  of  the  local  income  by  the  The  "cen- 

i  IT  •  •    •  times  ad- 

Very  simple  device  of  adding  something  tor  municipal    ditionnels." 

purposes  to  the  direct  tax-rates  before  any  collection 
is  made.  These  local  augmentations  are  known  as  the 
centimes  additionnels.  A  centime  is  the  hundreth  part 


206  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP. ii.  of  a  franc;  and  thus  if  the  amount  which  a  given 
municipality  must  collect  for  the  departmental  and 
national  treasuries  by  means  of  a  tax  on  land  and 
houses  is  one  hundred  thousand  francs,  an  imposi- 
tion for  local  purposes  of  fifty  centimes  additionnels 
would  mean  that  the  total  amount  to  be  collected 
from  real  estate  is  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 
francs,  of  which  fifty  thousand  will  be  retained  for 
the  local  treasury,  and  a  hundred  thousand  remitted 
to  the  superior  fiscal  authorities.  Subject  to  the  ap- 
proval of  the  prefects,  there  is  a  wide  range  of  discre- 
tion permitted  to  the  municipal  councils  in  the  extent 
to  which  they  may  employ  the  device  of  the  centimes 
additionnels,  and  the  practice  in  different  places  va- 
ries widely.  A  recent  copy  of  the  annual  report  upon 
the  financial  operations  of  all  the  communes  of  France 
shows  that  the  average  was  fifty-four  centimes  addi- 
tionnels for  the  year  1893, — which  simply  means  that 
of  the  amounts  collected  by  direct  taxes  the  com- 
munes retained  for  local  purposes  a  little  more  than 
one-third.  The  proportion  varies  greatly,  however, 
in  the  different  French  towns. 

For  most  towns  having  more  than  four  thousand 
inhabitants,  however,  the  largest  source  of  income  is 
the  octroi  system.  The  total  amounts  collected  by 
system,  the  authorities  of  the  1513  municipal  octroi  systems 
in  1893  was  in  excess  of  303,000,000  francs.  About 
one  third  of  this  amount  was  collected  upon  wines 
and  other  alcoholic  liquors.  Food-supplies  yielded 
approximately  one  third,  and  the  remainder  may  be 
ascribed  to  building  materials,  fuel,  and  other  heavy 
substances.  It  happens  that  the  octroi  revenues  are 
almost  evenly  divided  between  Paris  and  the  other 
fifteen  hundred  towns. 

The  chief         In  general  it  may  be  said  that  all  French  towns  of 
80u£ome! m"  considerable  size  rely  upon  the  octroi  receipts  as  their 


THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  SYSTEM 


207 


principal  source  of  municipal  revenue.  Thus  the  town 
of  Lyons,  whose  ordinary  receipts  for  1893  were  about 
twelve  million  six  hundred  thousand  francs,  derived 
8,750,000  from  the  octroi.  Of  the  nearly  four  million 
francs  remaining,  perhaps  half  was  derived  from  the 
centimes  additionnels,  while  the  rest  accrued  from  a 
variety  of  sources,  including  the  incomes  of  produc- 
tive municipal  departments.  The  receipts  of  Mar- 
seilles for  the  same  year  somewhat  exceeded  fifteen 
million  francs,  of  which  the  octroi  yielded  9,000,000 
francs  of  ordinary  revenue  and  2,000,000  francs  for 
special  purposes.  The  municipal  income  of  Lille  was 
somewhat  less  than  seven  million  francs,  and  the 
octroi  yielded  5,000,000.  Roubaix  derived  2,500,000 
francs  from  the  octroi  system,  the  total  income  of  the 
municipality  being  4,135,000  francs.  Rouen,  whose 
revenues  were  4,800,000  francs,  obtained  3,700,000 
francs  from  the  octroi.  Le  Havre,  with  receipts 
slightly  exceeding  four  million  nine  hundred  thou- 
sand francs,  derived  3,500,000  from  the  octroi.  Tou- 
louse, whose  income  was  not  quite  five  million  francs, 
was  indebted  to  the  octroi  for  3,280,000  francs.  These 
instances,  which  are  entirely  representative,  will  suffice 
to  show  how  large  a  factor  the  octroi  system  is  in  the 
finances  of  the  French  municipalities. 

The  octroi  system  is  to  be  viewed  as  an  historical 
fact.  If  it  were  non-existent,  it  is  scarcely  conceivable 
that  any  one  would  seriously  advocate  its  establish- 
ment as  a  method  for  the  collection  of  local  revenues. 
In  the  smaller  towns  the  system  is  undoubtedly  an 
expensive  one,  although  I  am  not  inclined  to  consider 
the  cost  of  the  maintenance  of  the  octroi  as  the  princi- 
pal argument  against  its  employment  for  the  larger 
towns.  The  octroi  is  by  no  means  a  compulsory  ar- 
rangement, and  the  law  provides  for  a  suppression  of 
the  system  by  any  locality  which  chooses  to  dispense 


CHAP.  II. 


Revenues 
of  Lyons 
and  Mar- 
seilles. 


Of  Lille, 

Roubaix, 

Rouen,  and 

Le  Havre. 


As  to  the 

character 

and  future  of 

the  octrois. 


208  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP,  ii  with  it,  after  a  careful  investigation,  in  which  the 
higher  authorities  participate.  The  point  of  the  in- 
quiry would  have  to  do  with  the  question  whether  or 
not  the  community  could  safely  and  satisfactorily  sub- 
stitute other  sources  of  revenue.  As  yet,  no  towns  of 
importance  have  emancipated  themselves  from  the  gir- 
dle of  local  custom-houses.  If  the  finances  of  the  na- 
tional government  justified  the  abandonment  of  the 
direct  property  taxes,  so  that  these  might  be  exclu- 
sively available  for  local  purposes,  there  would  un- 
questionably be  a  rapid  movement  among  the  towns 
for  the  abolition  of  the  octroi ;  and  with  such  a  move- 
ment fairly  initiated,  the  whole  system  would  be 
doomed.  When  the  longed-for  era  of  disarmament 
arrives,  and  national  expenditures  are  correspond- 
ingly lightened,  it  will  perhaps  become  feasible  to  ac- 
cord to  localities  the  full  benefit  of  real-estate  taxation, 
with  the  proviso  that  the  octroi  system, —  which  is  one 
of  the  few  medieval  survivals  in  the  institutions  of 
France, —  shall  be  totally  obliterated. 

While  the  debts  of  the  French  towns  are  by  no 
means  insignificant,  it  happens  that  the  debt  of  the 
commune  of  Paris  alone  is  much  in  excess  of  the  sum 
total  of  the  indebtedness  of  all  other  communes,  great 
and  small.  Thus  the  official  reports  for  1892  show 
that  whereas  the  capitalized  interest-bearing  debt  of 
Paris  amounted  to  somewhat  more  than  1,920,000,000 
francs,  the  aggregate  indebtedness  of  all  the  other 
communes  of  France  was  1,373,000,000.  The  debt  of 
Marseilles  was  in  that  year  106,000,000  francs,  this 
outlay  being  represented  by  various  public  improve- 
ments, principally,  however,  those  pertaining  to  har- 
bor facilities.  The  debt  of  Lyons  was  86,500,000 
francs,  that  of  Le  Havre  (largely  for  harbor  improve- 
ments) 48,000,000  francs,  that  of  Rouen  41,000,000 
francs,  and  that  of  Lille  40,000,000.  The  description 


THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL   SYSTEM  209 

I  have  given  of  the  modernization  of  street  systems  in  CHAP-  IL 
the  French  provincial  capitals  will  readily  explain  a 
considerable  share  of  the  outstanding  indebtedness, 
while  improved  water-supplies,  sewers,  new  school 
buildings,  public  abattoirs,  and  various  architectural 
and  sanitary  improvements  would  sufficiently  account 
for  the  rest. 

I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  the  conditions  of  life    ™*  general 

.  outlook  for 

in  the  French  provincial  towns  are  destined  to  improve    municipal 

.-,,.,,  „    ,,  .  -11  progress  in 

very  rapidly  in  the  course  of  the  coming  decade  or  France. 
two,  and  that,  for  France  at  least,  the  rate  of  move- 
ment of  population  from  the  country  to  the  towns  is 
destined  to  increase  somewhat  rather  than  to  dimin- 
ish. On  the  other  hand,  the  distinction  between  town 
and  country  in  France  is  likely  to  become  less  em- 
phatic, inasmuch  as  the  suburban  tendency  begins  to 
make  itself  felt,  the  compactness  and  density  of  town 
life  having  already  passed  its  maximum  and  begun  to 
grow  appreciably  less.  Improved  transit  systems  will 
rapidly  widen  the  area  of  municipalization  ;  and  thus 
the  country  at  large  will  become  more  urban  in  the 
character  of  its  improvements,  while  the  towns  will 
become  more  countrified,  by  reason  of  their  tree-lined 
thoroughfares,  their  outlying  parks,  and  their  villa- 
built  suburbs. 


14 


CHAPTER  III 


THE  SYSTEMS  OF  BELGIUM,   HOLLAND, 
AND   SPAIN 


The  French 

system  as  a 

type. 


Medieval 
Belgium. 


rilHE  account  that  has  been  given  of  the  character 
I  and  historical  development  of  the  French  system 
of  municipal  administration  will  make  it  a  compara- 
tively brief  and  simple  task  to  outline  the  systems  of 
several  adjacent  countries.  It  has  been  stated  in  the 
opening  paragraph  of  this  volume  that  French  influ- 
ence was  dominant  in  the  modern  revision  of  the  ad- 
ministrative framework  of  other  European  peoples; 
and  this  remark  applies  particularly  to  Belgium,  Hol- 
land, Spain,  French-speaking  Switzerland,  and  Italy. 
Each  of  these  countries  has  modified  the  French  sys- 
tem in  numerous  ways  for  its  own  practical  uses; 
yet  all  of  their  municipal  codes  of  to-day  may  for  our 
purposes  be  regarded  as  so  many  variations  of  one 
general  type.  The  differences  of  detail  are  much 
greater  than  those  that  distinguish  from  each  other 
the  English,  Scotch,  and  Irish  systems;  but  on  the 
other  hand  they  are  much  less  than  those  that  mark 
the  systems  of  different  states  in  the  United  States. 

The  Belgian  provinces  with  approximately  their 
present  bounds  are  very  ancient,  and  were  practi- 
cally independent  of  one  another  until  the  House  of 
Burgundy,  in  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries, 
knit  them  together  with  a  centralized  administration 
which  has  from  that  time  to  the  present  day  given 

them  a  common  destiny.    After  the  crumbling  of  the 

210 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM 


211 


Carlovingian  Empire,  the  Belgian  provinces  had  conie 
under  the  rule  of  feudal  princes  and  barons,  whose 
sway  had  in  turn  been  broken  down  by  the  rise  of 
the  "  communes,"  or  municipalities,  a  movement  be- 
ginning in  the  eleventh  century.  The  communes 
reached  a  very  high  degree  of  prosperity,  privilege, 
and  local  autonomy  in  the  thirteenth,  fourteenth,  and 
fifteenth  centuries.  The  great  part  which  the  feudal 
princes  of  Belgium  played  in  the  Crusades  had  en- 
abled the  communes  the  more  successfully  to  assert 
themselves.  Each  commune,  with  its  elected  council 
and  its  college  of  magistrates,  composed  of  a  burgo- 
master and  several  echevins,  formed  in  itself  a  minia- 
ture free  state.  The  House  of  Burgundy  superimposed 
a  superior  central  administration  upon  provinces  each 
of  which  had  already  its  long-standing  provincial  or- 
ganization  and  its  highly  developed  communal  system. 
In  order  to  produce  a  larger  unity,  the  measures  which 
depressed  and  enfeebled  the  communes  in  the  fifteenth 
century  and  subsequently  were  perhaps  justified. 
We  are  accustomed  to  regard  the  virility  of  Anglo- 
Saxon  institutions  as  due  in  large  part  to  the  persist- 
ence of  the  old-time  local  units  of  government,  the 
townships.  It  is,  however,  well  to  remember  that  the 
French  and  Belgian  communes  are  as  ancient  and 
as  worthy  of  respect  as  the  Anglo-Saxon  townships. 
Modern  constitutional  improvements  in  Belgium  have 
been  wisely  grafted  upon  the  ancient  structure  of 
provinces  and  communes. 

The  economic  character  of  the  pre-Revolutionary 
regime  in  Belgium  was  far  from  being  so  bad  as  that 
of  France.  In  Belgium,  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
the  nobles  and  the  Church  bore  their  respective  shares 
of  taxation,  and  the  masses  were  comparatively  com- 
fortable. The  more  violent  phases  of  the  French  Rev- 
olution were  fortunately  not  witnessed  in  Belgium, 


CHAP.  III. 


Rise  of  the 
communes. 


Miniature 
states. 


Central 
amalgama- 
tion. 


Historic  dig- 
nity of  the 
communes. 


Belgium  and 
the  French 
Revolution. 


212 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Annexed  to     , ...         ,  .       -« 0-i  ^ 

France.      Napoleon  in  1814. 


A  trans- 
forming ex- 
perience. 


Permanent 
results. 


while  the  beneficent  and  just  principles  of  the  new  po- 
litical philosophy  of  France  had  free  course  and  gen- 
eral acceptance  in  the  neighbor  country.  In  1794 
Belgium  was  annexed  by  the  French  Republic,  and  it 
shared  the  fortunes  of  France  until  the  downfall  of 
Compared  with  the  old  France, 
the  old  Belgium  was  certainly  an  elysium;  but  its 
society  was  lethargic  and  uuprogressive.  The  Revo- 
lution and  the  French  intrusion  made  an  awakening 
that  was  exceedingly  rough  and  uncomfortable,  but 
thoroughly  beneficial  in  the  end.  As  a  primary-school 
summary  of  Belgian  history  quaintly  remarks  :  A  la 
suite  de  la  victoire  de  Fleurus,  la  Belgique  passe  &  la 
France,  dont  le  regime  a  ses  rigueurs,  mais  nous  pro- 
cure de  precieuses  libertes."  The  transformation 
wrought  in  a  very  few  years  is  well  summed  up  by  a 
spirited  Belgian  historian  :  "  1789,  c'est  la  vieille  Bel- 
gique, la  Belgique  provinciale  et  communale,  telle  que 
1'ont  formee  les  siecles,  avec  ses  antiques  privileges, 
ses  rouages  compliques,  ses  classes  juxtaposees,  ses 
trois  e"tats,  son  clerge  tout-puissant,  son  esprit  par- 
ticulariste  et  conservateur  —  1799,  tfest  la  Belgique 
nouvelle,  la  Belgique  unifee,  telle  que  1'a  modelee  le 
clair  genie  de  la  France,  avec  son  administration  sim- 
ple, sa  egalite  civique,  son  clerge  fonctionnaire,  son 
esprit  centralisateur  et  progressif  ."  The  existing  civil 
and  criminal  codes,  the  machinery  of  civil  adminis- 
tration, and  the  arrangements  and  procedure  of  ju- 
dicial tribunals  have  grown  essentially  out  of  those 
introduced  from  France  in  the  Napoleonic  period. 

The  allied  powers,  convened  at  Paris  in  1814  to  ar- 
range  terms  of  peace  with  France,  determined  upon 
the  fusion  of  Belgium  and  Holland,  and  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  kingdom  of  the  Low  Countries,  under 
the  rule  of  the  Prince  of  Orange  as  William  I.  The 
new  power  was  erected  upon  the  basis  of  a  constitu- 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM  213 

tional  document  known  as  "  the  Fundamental  Law  o.f    CHAP.  in. 
1815 ; "  and  a  very  liberal  charter  it  was,  when  one 
considers  the  mood  in  which  the  conquerors  were, 
and  their  dislike  of  advanced  and  "  Frenchified "  po- 
litical notions.     It  had  been  adopted  by  Holland  in    Fundamen- 

*  *  tal  Law  of 

1814,  and  its  benefits  were  extended  to  Belgium  by  isis. 
the  fusion  of  the  following  year.  The  Fundamental 
Law  recognized  most  of  "  the  rights  of  man,"  gave  the 
provinces  and  communes  their  own  administration, 
and,  in  short,  established  modern  representative  in- 
stitutions. But  while  the  government  of  William  was 
in  the  main  advantageous  and  just,  it  was  in  minor 
respects  exceedingly  unpopular  and  obnoxious  in  the 
Belgian  provinces.  The  Belgians  for  the  most  part 
talked  French,  and  they  disliked  Dutch  as  the  official 
language.  Holland  was  Protestant,  while  Belgium 
was  intensely  Catholic,  and  the  Church  found  itself 
uncomfortably  fettered.  Dutch  views  seemed  to  pre- 

•i    .  ,••  .  ,-,  .  ,.     '        ,,    The  "regime 

vail  in  everything,  to  the  growing  exasperation  01  hoiiandais." 
the  Belgians,  who  felt  themselves  under  a  foreign 
yoke  rather  than  an  integral  part  of  a  self-governing 
country.  The  Belgians  all  admit  that  what  they  term 
the  regime  hoiiandais  was  highly  favorable  to  the  de- 
velopment of  their  industry  and  commerce,  and  no- 
table for  the  great  impulse  given  to  education ;  but 
while  acknowledging  and  respecting  the  many  supe- 
rior qualities  of  the  Netherlanders,  the  Belgians  found 
the  union  ill-assorted  and  incompatible.  They  ad- 
mired the  Dutch  as  neighbors,  but  could  not  endure 
to  keep  house  with  them.  In  1830,  they  pronounced 
themselves  divorced  from  a  union  which  had  been  einai83o?n 
forced  upon  them  without  their  consent  by  the  Trea- 
ties of  Paris  and  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  and  they 
succeeded  in  maintaining  an  independence  which  at 
first  was  viewed  unfavorably  by  Europe  and  vigor- 
ously opposed  by  Holland.  A  provisional  govern- 
u* 


214 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Constitu- 
tional con- 
vention of 
1830. 


CHAP.  in.    merit  declared  Belgium  an  independent  state,  and 
called  a  national  congress  to  adopt  a  constitution. 

Few  constitutional  assemblies  have  ever  been  more 
thoroughly  representative,  and  few  have  ever  shown 
a  higher  degree  of  political  sagacity,  than  that  which 
assembled  at  Brussels  in  November,  1830,  and  com- 
pleted its  labors  in  the  following  February.  "Within 
a  period  of  about  forty  years  Europe  and  America  had 
witnessed  a  series  of  most  remarkable  constitutional 
experiments.  New  principles  had  been  developed,  and 
what  we  term  the  modern  era  of  constitutionalism  had 
fairly  set  in.  There  were  in  this  convention  a  num- 
ber of  able  and  brilliant  men,  and  the  discussions 
were  of  the  most  important  character.  Some  of  the 
two  hundred  members  believed  that  the  time  had 
come  to  establish  a  republic ;  and,  with  the  House  of 
Orange  forever  excluded  by  a  formal  vote,  the  ques- 
tion seemed  to  rest  upon  its  pure  merits.  It  was  de- 
cided, after  a  discussion  of  the  actual  situation,  do- 
mestic and  foreign,  that  an  hereditary  constitutional 
monarchy,  with  ministerial  responsibility,  and  with 
large  provision  for  provincial  and  communal  home- 
rule,  would  be  the  best  form  of  government  for  Bel- 
gium, and  only  thirteen  votes  dissented,  although  the 
republic  was  frankly  avowed  by  many  to  be  their  ideal. 
The  sovereignty  of  the  people  was,  however,  declared, 
and  not  a  vestige  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  was  left 
in  the  reconstituted  system.  The  nature  and  limita- 
tions of  the  monarchy  were,  fortunately,  determined 
before  the  monarch  himself  was  selected. 

The  Belgian  constitution-makers  of  1830  understood 
the  nature  of  their  task.  It  was  theirs  to  preserve  in 
unified  and  harmonious  form  the  old  institutions  of 
the  provinces  and  communes,  and  to  weave  into  the 
new  fabric  those  modern  liberties,  individual  and  so- 
cial, which  the  French  Revolution  had  rescued  from 


Popular 
sovereignty. 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM 


215 


the  de"bris  of  feudalism,  and  which  the  French  regime 
in  Belgium  had  left  as  an  imperishable  souvenir  in 
the  political  creeds,  if  not  in  the  ordinary  practice  of 
the  country.  Then  there  was  the  very  respectable 
constitution  of  Holland,  which  a  joint  commission  of 
Belgian  and  Dutch  notables  had  revised  in  1815,  and 
under  which  the  people  of  the  two  countries  had  now 
lived  for  fifteen  years.  This  document  might  well  be 
taken  as  the  basis  of  comparison,  the  point  of  depar- 
ture. Then  the  French  Revolution  of  1830  had  pro- 
duced exemplary  legislative  changes.  Good  use,  more- 
over, was  to  be  made  of  English  and  American  expe- 
rience ;  and,  finally,  there  were,  in  the  precise  Belgian 
situation  and  in  the  causes  that  had  led  to  the  Revo- 
lution of  1830,  many  things  to  tax  the  critical  and  the 
constructive  faculties  of  the  national  assembly.  The 
result  was  not  only  one  of  the  clearest  and  most  scien- 
tific instruments  of  organic  law  ever  drafted  by  any 
man  or  body  of  men,  but  also  one  of  the  best  in  point 
of  practical  fitness.  The  revolutionary  waves  of  1848 
and  1870  which  swept  across  Europe  were  quite  with- 
out effect  in  Belgium,  where  the  people  were  already 
in  the  enjoyment  of  substantial  constitutional  liber- 
ties. Full  freedom  of  worship,  of  instruction,  of  the 
press  and  the  theater,  of  assembly  and  association,  of 
petition,  of  language, —  these  social  rights,  only  partly 
protected  under  the  regime  hollandais,  were  specifi- 
cally guaranteed  in  the  constitution  of  1831,  together 
with  those  individual  rights  of  perfect  equality  before 
the  law,  and  of  inviolability  of  domicile  and  property 
that  have  had  more  universal  recognition. 

The  nine  provinces  (Antwerp,  Brabant,  East  Flan 
ders,  West  Flanders,  Hainaut,  Liege,  Limbourg,  Lux- 
embourg, and  Namur),  whose  lines  were  revised  by  the 
French  on  the  analogy  of  their  new  "departments," 
have  each  their  elective  assembly,  known  as  provincial 


CHAP.  III. 


Sources  of 

the  new 

constitution. 


Successful 
results. 


Guaranteed 
rights. 


The  nine 
provinces. 


216 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Provincial 
councils. 


The  governor 
and  his  func- 
tions. 


The  com- 
munes and 
the  munici- 
pal govern- 
ments. 


The  elective 
franchise. 


councils ;  these  bodies  varying  in  number,  according  to 
the  provincial  population,  from  forty-one  in  Limbourg 
to  ninety-two  in  East  Flanders.  The  assembly  meets  in 
a  brief  annual  session  at  the  chief  town  of  the  pro- 
vince, and  deals  with  matters  of  purely  provincial 
concern.  Councilors  are  elected  for  four  years,  half 
of  them  retiring  every  two  years.  The  most  impor- 
tant work  of  the  council  is  done  by  a  standing  com- 
mittee of  six  members  (la  deputation  permanente), 
which  acts  as  a  governor's  administrative  council. 
The  provincial  governor  corresponds  to  the  French 
prefect,  being  appointed  by  the  king,  and  having  ex- 
ecutive authority  in  the  name  of  the  general  govern- 
ment. But  the  Belgian  province  has  a  somewhat 
larger  measure  of  autonomy  than  the  French  "  depart- 
ment." For  certain  judicial  and  electoral  purposes 
the  provinces  are  divided  into  cantons  and  arron- 
dissements;  but  these  are  merely  territorial  circum- 
scriptions, and  have  no  corporate  character.  The  es- 
sential internal  divisions  of  Belgium  are  the  provinces 
and  communes.  There  are  2600  communes,  each 
with  its  municipal  government.  Some  of  them  are 
densely  filled  with  an  urban  population,  and  others 
are  mere  rural  townships;  but  each  has  its  elected 
council,  its  burgomaster,  and  its  echevins.  The  size 
of  these  municipal  councils  varies  with  the  popula- 
tion, from  nine  or  ten  members  in  the  smallest  to 
thirty  or  more  in  the  large  places. 

Unlike  the  French,  the  Belgians  have  never  adopted 
the  plan  of  universal  suffrage.  The  Flemish  and  Bel- 
gian constitution-makers  of  1815  and  1830  were  con- 
servative upon  this  question  of  the  franchise;  and 
restrictions  were  imbedded  in  the  fundamental  law 
which  it  was  almost  impossible  to  dislodge.  The  con- 
stitution withstood  attack  until  1893,  when  the  old 
system  was  changed  in  a  manner  which  I  shall  pro- 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM 


217 


ceed  to  explain.  But  it  may  be  well  first  to  sum  up 
the  electoral  arrangements  which  were  in  existence 
until  that  time.  The  payment  of  direct  taxes  to  the 
state  was  made  the  condition  of  voting,  and  the  con- 
stitution provided  that  the  sum  should  be  determined 
from  time  to  time  by  law,  the  maximum  being  one  hun- 
dred florins,  and  the  minimum  twenty  florins.  At 
first  a  schedule  was  enacted  which  made  different 
rates  for  town  and  country,  and  also  for  different 
provinces,  the  average  rate  being  much  higher  than 
the  constitutional  minimum.  But  in  1848,  under  the 
influence  of  the  universal  wave  of  democratic  feeling, 
the  differences  were  all  abolished,  and  the  minimum 
of  twenty  florins  was  made  the  uniform  qualification, 
by  unanimous  vote  of  both  Chambers.  It  should  be 
remembered  that  this  sum  (42.32  francs,  equal  to 
about  $8.50)  was  to  be  paid  as  direct  taxes  to  the 
state,  and  that  payment  of  provincial  and  municipal 
taxes  did  not  count  toward  electoral  qualification. 
"When  in  1893  the  system  was  changed  by  constitu- 
tional amendment,  there  were  only  about  130,000 
voters, —  one  in  thirteen  of  the  adult  males,  or  one  in 
fifty  of  the  population. 

For  a  long  time  there  was  very  little  agitation  in 
any  quarter  for  an  extension  of  the  suffrage,  and  the 
system  was  destined  to  remain  as  it  was  until  the  in- 
tellectual emancipation  of  the  masses  had  made  much 
greater  progress.  Under  the  existing  system  of  com- 
pulsory education  the  reproach  of  illiteracy  is  fast 
disappearing.  In  1880,  forty-two  per  cent,  of  the  pop- 
ulation above  fifteen  years  of  age  was  absolutely  illit- 
erate, while  all  but  about  twenty-nine  per  cent,  of  the 
children  between  seven  and  fifteen  could  read  and 
write.  The  statistics  of  1890  showed  a  very  marked 
improvement,  illiterates  above  the  age  of  fifteen  having 
fallen  from  42  per  cent,  to  26.9  per  cent,  in  a  single 


CHAP.  III. 


The  system 
prior  to  1893. 


One  voten 
for  fifty 
people;. 


Decrease  of 
illiteracy. 


218  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  in.  decade.  In  deference  to  the  demands  of  a  growing 
popular  intelligence,  there  was  enacted  in  1883  a  law 

Educational    establishing  an  educational  qualification  for  the  pro- 

for  voting,  vincial  and  communal  franchise.  This  new  law  added 
to  the  electoral  lists  two  classes  of  persons,  irrespec- 
tive of  tax-paying :  first,  all  persons  exercising  speci- 
fied liberal  professions,  holders  of  diplomas  from 
specified  classes  of  institutions,  occupants  of  impor- 
tant official,  commercial,  and  social  positions  under 
specified  conditions,  and  so  on  through  a  carefully 
elaborated  schedule;  and  second,  those  who  should 
pass  successfully  an  electoral  examination,  the  de- 
tails of  which  were  prescribed  in  the  law. 

Educational  qualification  has  been  much  discussed 
theoretically,  both  in  Europe  and  America,  but  has 
had  very  meager  practical  trial  anywhere.  This  Bel- 

An  instruct-  cnan  experiment  was  the  more  interesting  for  that 

ive  expert-  r 

ment.  reason.  The  requirements  were  made  to  correspond 
in  a  general  way  with  the  amount  and  kind  of  know- 
ledge included  in  the  compulsory  school  courses,  the 
intention  being  that  the  boy  who  had  completed  his 
school  attendance  should  be  well  prepared,  with  a 
little  reviewing,  to  take  the  electoral  examination. 
The  programme  of  obligatory  instruction  in  Belgian 

Subjects  ob-        .      r.      ?     ,     ,     ,  ...  ...  ...          .,       .,       , 

ligatory  in    schools  included  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  the  le- 
scnoois!      gal  system  of  weights  and  measures,  the  elements  of 
the  French,  Flemish,  or  German  language  (according 
to  the  province  or  locality),  geography,  Belgian  his- 
tory and  civil  government,  drawing,  singing,  gym- 
nastics, and  the  principles  of  agriculture  in  schools  of 
rural  communes.   The  electoral  examination  embraced 
all  these  subjects  except  drawing,  singing,  gymnastics, 
quired  for    and  agriculture.    As  originally  enacted,  the  law  re- 

electoral  ex- 

animation,  quired  the  presentation  of  school  certificates  as  a  pre- 
liminary; but  this  demand  was  afterward  modified. 
The  candidate  had  to  be  fully  eighteen  years  old. 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM  219 

(He  was  not,  of  course,  to  exercise  the  franchise  until    CHAP.  in. 
he  was  twenty-one.)     He  might  have  his  examination 
in  the  French,  Flemish,  or  German  language,  and 
choose  between  an  evening  and  a  Sunday  sitting. 

T     i  i ,.      ™        i  -.  Conductor 

The  examinations'  were  held  111  March  of  each  year  in  examination, 
the  chief  town  of  every  canton,  and  the  state  railways 
carried  the  candidates  up  to  the  ordeal  and  home 
again  at  half  price.  The  examinations  were  conducted 
by  "juries  of  three"  members  each,  named  by  the 
minister  of  the  interior.  Each  jury  was  composed  of 
a  principal  or  leading  instructor  in  a  middle  school  of 
the  state  system,  a  like  educator  from  a  private  mid- 
dle school,  and  a  third  person  not  engaged  in  educa- 
tional work,  who  acted  as  president.  The  answers 
were  wholly  in  writing,  and  the  questions  to  be  sub- 
mitted were  selected  by  lot,  in  the  presence  of  the 
candidates,  from  a  very  large  list  prepared  and  pub- 
lished by  the  government. 

The  current  lists  held  good  for  a  period  of  four  years, 
and  it  was  the  privilege  of  the  candidate  to  study  all 
the  questions  at  his  leisure,  in  advance.  Publishers 
issued  the  questions  with  answers  annexed,  to  make 
"cramming"  as  easy  as  possible.  But  the  examina- 
tion was,  nevertheless,  far  from  being  a  farce.  The 
official  questionnaire  contained  one  hundred  numbered  lists.011 
passages,  averaging  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  words 
each,  from  the  writings  of  standard  authors.  A  num- 
ber was  drawn,  and  the  corresponding  passage  was 
slowly  dictated  to  the  candidates,  to  test  at  once  their 
ability  to  read,  write,  and  spell.  To  answer  the  ques- 
tions on  the  history  of  Belgium  (111  in  the  question- 
naire) required  a  remarkably  thorough  knowledge, 
involving  also  much  of  general  European  history  from 
the  time  of  Caesar  to  the  middle  of  the  present  cen- 
tury ;  while  the  fifty  or  more  questions  on  the  prin- 
ciples of  the  Belgian  constitution  called  for  know- 


220 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


The  system 
in  practice. 


CHAP.  in.  ledge  both  accurate  and  mature.  The  geography 
questions  numbered  nearly  two  hundred,  and  re- 
quired a  minute  knowledge  of  Belgium,  a  very  thor- 
ough acquaintance  with  the  natural  and  political  fea- 
tures of  Europe,  and  a  fair  knowledge  of  the  whole 
world.  One  hundred  and  fifty  problems  in  general 
arithmetic  were  given,  and  as  many  more  dealt  with 
measures  of  length,  measures  of  surface,  measures  of 
volume  and  capacity,  with  weights,  and  with  money. 
Questions  from  each  category  were  successively  drawn. 
The  precautions  to  insure  fairness  were  many  and  ef- 
fective. Resident  electors  were  allowed  to  be  repre- 
sented by  witnesses,  who  observed  that  all  was  done 
in  the  interest  of  fair  play.  The  examination  papers 
were  collected,  sealed  in  a  package,  and  transmitted 
to  the  examining  board  of  some  other  canton,  selected 
by  lot,  to  be  read  and  marked.  Reading  and  writing 
together  counted  for  ten  points,  and  the  other  five 
branches  for  five  points  each.  To  pass  the  examina- 
tion and  receive  a  diploma  it  was  necessary  to  have 
gained  at  least  twenty-one  points  out  of  a  possible 
thirty-five.  The  requirements  seemed  rather  formi- 
dable ;  but  they  were  open  to  a  liberal  construction,  so 
that  if  the  candidate  were  but  able  to  write  legibly,  to 
spell  respectably,  to  solve  ordinary  every-day  prob- 
lems in  figures,  and  to  use  current  weights  and  mea- 
sures, he  might  fail  in  history  and.  geography  and  still 
pass  the  ordeal.  An  examination  system  can  never 
be  free  from  all  objections ;  and  Belgium's  had  per- 
haps as  few  as  any  ever  devised. 

The  body  of  provincial  and  communal  electors 
gradually  became  vastly  larger  than  that  of  the  legis- 
lative electors.  Only  those  who  paid  forty-two  francs 
of  direct  state  taxes  voted  for  senators  and  represen- 
tatives. For  provincial  elections  the  limit  had  been 
reduced  to  twenty  francs,  and  for  the  municipal  fran- 


Growth  of 
the  munici' 
pal  voting 
'  list. 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM 


221 


chise  to  ten  francs, —  direct  taxes  paid  to  the  treasury 
of  the  state  alone  being  reckoned.  The  enrolment 
of  individuals  by  virtue  of  professions  and  positions 
(capacitaires  de  droit),  and  of  those  who  passed  the 
educational  test  (capacitaires  apr&s  examen],  reinforced 
the  number  of  those  possessing  the  property  qualifi- 
cation (censitaires)  as  regards  the  provincial  and  mu- 
nicipal elections. 

In  1893,  after  a  memorable  period  of  agitation,  the 
electoral  clauses  of  the  constitution  were  changed. 
For  the  election  of  members  of  the  Chamber  of  Rep- 
resentatives, every  male  citizen  twenty-five  years  old, 
who  had  been  a  year  in  the  commune  where  he  was 
domiciled,  was  given  one  vote.  An  additional  or  plu- 
ral vote  was  given  to  married  men  or  widowers  over 
thirty-five  years  old  having  children,  provided  they 
paid  as  much  as  five  francs  a  year  as  a  house-occu- 
pancy tax.  Finally,  two  additional  votes  (three  al- 
together) were  accorded  to  professional  men  and 
others  having  diplomas  of  higher  instruction,  while  a 
plural  vote  was  also  allowed  to  real-estate  owners. 
This  arrangement  increased  the  number  of  legislative 
votes  almost  tenfold.  Qualifications  for  choosing 
senators  were  made  the  same,  except  that  senatorial 
voters  must  be  thirty  years  old. 

A  law  was  passed  in  1894  which  made  the  qualifica- 
tions for  the  election  of  provincial  councils  the  same 
as  those  for  the  election  of  senators.  It  was  not  un- 
til April,  1895,  that  the  municipal  and  communal  fran- 
chise was  revised.  Until  that  time  the  local  electors 
were  those  above  the  age  of  twenty-one  who  paid  di- 
rect taxes  of  ten  francs,  together  with  others  entitled 
to  vote  under  the  educational  qualifications.  But  the 
new  law  of  1895  absolutely  disfranchises  every  man  un- 
der the  age  of  thirty.  Every  citizen  above  that  age 
is  entitled  to  one  vote  at  a  municipal  election,  pro- 


CHAP.  III. 


Extension  of 

the  national 

franchise  in 

1893. 


Plural  votes. 


New  provin- 
cial electo- 
rate, 1894. 


Municipal 

suffrage  law 

of  1895. 


222 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Supplement- 
ary votes  to 
fathers  of 
families. 


A  conserva- 
tive electo- 
rate. 


Universal 
suffrage  and 
proportional 

representa- 
tion rejected. 


Educational 
test  repealed. 


Councils 

chosen  on 

general 

ticket. 


vided  he  has  been  a  resident  of  the  place  for  three 
years.  A  supplementary  vote  is  given  to  family  men 
above  the  age  of  thirty-five  who  are  assessed  a  certain 
sum  as  householders.  This  sum  is  fifteen  francs  in 
places  having  more  than  ten  thousand  inhabitants, 
five  francs  in  communes  of  less  than  two  thousand, 
and  ten  francs  in  those  having  from  two  to  ten  thou- 
sand people.  A  second  supplementary  vote  is  granted 
to  property  owners  who  derive  a  revenue  of  at  least 
one  hundred  and  fifty  francs  a  year  from  real  estate. 

Thus  (1)  the  total  exclusion  of  men  who  ai"e  under 
thirty,  and  (2)  the  requirement  of  a  three  years'  resi- 
dence, practically  eliminate  from  the  Belgian  municipal 
electorate  the  great  majority  of  unmarried  men  and 
all  the  floating  industrial  element.  The  second  vote 
allowed  to  tax-paying  house-occupiers  with  families, 
and  the  third  vote  to  real-estate  owners,  give  assured 
control  of  municipal  affairs  to  the  well-to-do  classes. 
The  workingmen  of  the  labor  unions,  and  the  large 
socialist  element,  clamored  in  vain  for  universal  suf- 
frage. The  Liberal  party  would  have  preferred  a 
more  popular  system,  and  the  leaders  of  Liberalism 
were  strongly  committed  to  the  principle  of  propor- 
tional representation  in  the  choice  of  municipal  coun- 
cils. But  the  Conservative  or  Catholic  party,  which 
was  in  control  of  the  government,  insisted  upon  mak- 
ing the  local  suffrage  more  restricted  than  the  na- 
tional. With  the  new  system,  of  course,  educational 
qualification  as  adopted  in  1883  disappeared  altogether. 

The  municipal  councils  continue  to  be  elected  by 
the  qualified  voters  on  general  tickets  for  terms  of  six 
years,  half  of  the  number  being  chosen  every  three 
years.  The  ward  system  has  never  commended  itself 
to  the  Belgians.  It  happens  that  a  majority  of  the 
propertied  and  intelligent  classes  in  the  large  towns 
belong  to  the  Liberal  party,  and  that  the  restrictions 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM 


223 


A  political 

paradox. 


system. 


upon  the  franchise  have  always  operated  in  favor  of  CHAP.  in. 
the  very  party  which  has  advocated  a  more  demo- 
cratic system.  The  situation  involves  a  curious  po- 
litical paradox.  The  Conservative  position  in  the 
municipalities  would  be  much  stronger  with  propor- 
tional  representation,  which  the  Liberals  advocate; 
but  the  Conservative  majority  in  the  national  legisla- 
ture insists  upon  the  maintenance  of  a  system  in  the 
local  elections  which  has  long  kept  the  Conservative 
or  Catholic  Church  party  —  despite  its  overwhelming 
influence  with  the  masses  —  from  controlling  the  mu- 
nicipal governments  of  any  of  the  large  towns. 

The  Belgians  have  adopted  a  form  of  secret  ballot 
that  is  worth  attention  as  being  better  in  some  respects 
than  any  in  use  elsewhere.  The  ordinary  French  sys- 
tern  of  balloting  was  in  vogue  in  Belgium  prior  to 
1877.  In  that  year  the  English  system  (commonly 
called  in  America  the  Australian  system)  was  adopted, 
as  a  safeguard  against  prevalent  bribery  and  intimi- 
dation. The  English  plan  of  ballots  prepared  by  the 
authorities  was  found,  of  course,  a  great  advance. 
But  it  did  not  secure  absolute  secrecy;  for  instructed 
or  purchased  voters  were  required,  in  many  cases, 
by  those  who  controlled  them,  to  make  the  cross  or 
mark  in  some  prescribed  and  recognizable  way,  so 
that  interested  persons  could  know  to  a  certainty 
whether  pledges  were  fulfilled  or  not.  All  this  was 
done  away  with  by  the  substitution  of  gutta-percha 
stamps  for  pencils,  in  the  alcoves  of  the  polling  places. 
The  property  qualification  admits  many  illiterates  to 
the  ballot;  and  it  is  found  practically  objectionable 
to  allow  the  president  or  any  other  official  of  the  day 
to  accompany  such  voters  into  the  alcoves  to  read  and 
explain  the  ticket.  Different  colors  are  used  for  the 
benefit  of  illiterates.  Thus,  in  the  legislative  elec- 
tions, the  average  district  is  entitled  to  choose  several 


illiterates. 


224  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  in.  members.  The  Catholics  prepare  their  list  of  candi- 
dates, and  send  it  in  to  the  authorities  with  the  sig- 
natures of  at  least  forty  electors  to  constitute  a  valid 
nomination.  The  Liberals  do  likewise.  The  parties 
are  so  perfectly  organized  that  the  occasions  are  ex- 
Nominations,  tremely  rare  when  any  other  than  the  two  regular 
lists  are  sent  in.  The  authorities  print  the  two  sets 
of  names  in  parallel  columns  on  the  voting  paper, 
printing  the  Catholic  list  in  red  and  the  Liberal  list 
in  blue.  At  the  head  of  each  list  is  printed  a  device 
which  incloses  a  blank  white  patch.  The  voter  places 
the  inked  stamp  in  the  Catholic  or  in  the  Liberal  patch 
at  his  option,  folds  the  ticket,  and  deposits  his  vote. 
He  may  vote  a  mixed  list,  if  he  chooses ;  in  which 

Method  of  J 

voting.  case  he  affixes  the  stamp  in  a  space  left  for  that  pur- 
pose at  the  end  of  each  name.  He  can  vote  only  for 
names  printed  on  the  ticket,  and  only  for  as  many  as 
the  number  of  places  to  be  filled.  Sometimes  it  hap- 
pens that  more  than  two  tickets  are  nominated.  In 
municipal  elections  at  Brussels  there  have  been  four 
parties  in  the  field, —  Catholic,  Liberal,  Radical,  and 
Socialist.  In  such  cases  the  additional  lists  are  printed 
in  still  different  colors  on  the  same  ballot  paper.  The 
instances  are  exceptional  where  voters  do  not  adhere 
to  the  regular  and  complete  party  list.  A  man  votes 
"  red "  or  he  votes  "  blue,"  and  stamps  his  ticket  ac- 
cordingly. It  will  be  observed  that  the  requirement 
of  so  many  as  forty  signatures  to  a  nomination  paper 
helps  to  maintain  party  discipline  and  to  keep  down 
party  ties,  random  voting.  In  all  its  details  the  system  would 
not  be  perfectly  applicable  for  a  country  where  par- 
ties are  less  rigid  and  omnipotent  than  in  Belgium ; 
but  the  use  of  the  stamp  is  an  improvement  which 
might  advantageously  be  adopted  everywhere. 

The  communal  lines  are  sometimes  much  more  re- 
stricted than  the  area  of  a  large  town.    Thus  Brussels 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM  225 

as  a  metropolis  had  500,000  people  in  1895,  while  the  CHAP.  in. 
commune  of  Brussels  —  the  "  municipal  corporation," 
as  we  should  say  —  had  hardly  200,000.  The  council- 
ors  in  the  larger  communes  are  usually  intelligent 
and  active  men — barristers,  engineers,  manufacturers, 
and  progressive  citizens  of  various  callings.  The  bur- 
gomaster, or  mayor,  is  appointed  by  the  king  (that  is, 
by  the  government  of  the  day)  from  the  members  of 
the  communal  council,  usually  in  concurrence  with 

Burgomas- 

the  known  or  supposed  wishes  of  the  majority,  and  he  tens. 
holds  his  place  for  an  indefinite  term.  In  all  but  the 
larger  communes  there  are  two  echevins,  selected  from 
the  membership  of  the  council,  and  having  executive 
duties  to  perform  as  associates  and  assistants  of  the 
mayor.  They  hold  for  six  years.  In  Brussels  and  The  echevins. 
Antwerp  there  are  five  echevins,  and  in  the  other 
large  towns  there  are  four.  These,  with  the  burgo- 
master to  preside  over  them,  form  a  standing  execu- 
tive board,  and  supervise  municipal  works,  have 
charge  of  the  sanitary  administration  as  a  board  of 
health,  and  so  on.  The  system  is  simple  and  efficient. 
The  burgomaster  presides  at  the  sessions  of  the  coun- 
cil as  well  as  at  those  of  the  "  echevinal  college,"  and  is 
at  once  a  servant  of  the  commune  and  a  representa- 
tive in  the  commune  of  the  executive  power  of  the 
state.  The  college  of  echevins  has  control  of  the  civil  board. m 
registers  of  births,  deaths,  and  marriages,  and  is 
charged  with  the  duty  of  executing  in  the  commune 
all  the  laws  and  mandates  of  the  superior  governments 
of  the  province  and  the  realm,  thus  having  general  as 
well  as  merely  local  functions.  The  burgomastership 
becomes  in  some  towns  a  sort  of  dynasty.  In  Ant-  Dynastic 

burgomas- 

werp  the  burgomaster  of  1850  was  succeeded  by  his        ters. 
son,  who  has  in  turn  been  succeeded  by  his  son-in- 
law,  thus  keeping  the  office  in  the  family  for  three 
generations. 

15 


226  MUNICIPAL  GOVEKNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  in.  The  Belgian  echevins,  obviously,  correspond  to  the 
French  adjuncts,  forming  with  the  burgomaster  a 
standing  executive  committee  of  the  same  character 

compared     as  that  which  in  the  French  municipalities  is  made  up 

with  French   ,  i     i  •  •«  •  T-»T 

system,  of  the  mayor  and  his  adjuncts.  But  whereas  in 
France  the  executive  authority  is  conferred  upon  the 
mayor  alone,  who  in  turn  distributes  their  tasks  to  his 
adjuncts,  in  Belgium  much  of  the  authority  is  reposed 
in  the  collective  group.  The  French  mayor  exercises 
the  appointive  power,  while  in  Belgium  the  municipal 
council  itself  appoints  the  municipal  employees,  as  in 
England.  The  theory  upon  which  the  king  names 
the  burgomasters  and  e"chevins  has  regard  for  the  fact 
that  these  officials  are  charged  with  the  local  execu- 
tion of  the  general  laws.  Local  self-government  in 
Belgium  does  not  in  practice  suffer  any  considerable 
Burgomaster  limitation  from  the  nominal  selection  of  the  burgo- 
masters  by  the  king.  The  burgomaster  is  personally 


charged  with  the  police  authority. 

Those  who  regret  the  rapid  disappearance  of  the 

quaint  and  old-fashioned  in  European  cities  must  be 

shocked  at  the  changes  which  a  few  years  have  made 

in  the  principal  places  of  Belgium.    Parts  of  these 

.  towns  are  now  not  unlike  parts  of  Omaha,  Minneap- 

The  march  of  tr~  r 

municipal     olis,  or  Kansas  City,  in  their  freshness  and  newness  and 

improve-  * 

ment.  in  the  general  character  of  their  architecture.  There 
has  been  a  great  passion  in  Belgium  for  municipal 
renovation,  and  much  has  been  done  on  lines  similar 
to  those  by  which  New  and  Corporation  streets  were 
constructed  in  Birmingham.  In  about  1875,  the  Bel- 
gian law  regarding  ex-appropriation  was  altered  to 
permit  such  improvements.  The  town  of  Liege,  for 
.  street  re-  example,  bought  up  all  the  houses  —  old  and  poor,  for 
L?fege!n  the  most  part  —  lining  a  narrow  but  central  and  im- 
portant street.  The  houses  were  demolished  and  the 
street  was  greatly  widened.  The  building  sites  were 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM  227 

then  sold  in  toto  to  a  company  for  an  amount  more  CHAP.  in. 
than  sufficient  to  cover  the  cost  of  original  purchase 
and  of  demolition.  The  company  built  in  part  and 
sold  lots  in  part,  and  the  result  is  a  magnificent  mod- 
ern street,  now  solidly  built  up.  The  beautiful  broad 
boulevard,  with  double  rows  of  splendid  trees,  that 
curves  through  Liege,  was  once  the  course  of  the 
Meuse  (or  rather  of  one  branch,  the  original  town 
being  upon  an  island).  But  the  river  was  diverted 
into  a  straighter  channel  some  seventy  years  ago,  and 
a  grand  street  was  made  of  the  other  and  longer 
channel.  About  1879,  a  smaller  island,  then  unbuilt 
upon,  was  acquired  by  the  government,  and  sold  to 
the  municipality  of  Liege  for  1,000,000  francs.  The  speculation. 
town  authorities  laid  out  fine  streets  and  sold  build- 
ing sites.  Within  two  years  the  new  "addition"  was 
splendidly  built  up  with  showy  residence  rows.  The 
city's  speculation  was  a  very  lucrative  one. 

But  these  things  are  not  always  carried  out  so 
smoothly.  Visitors  to  Brussels  must  have  been  im- 
pressed with  the  broad  and  exceedingly  handsome  new  Brussels  and 
business  thoroughfare  on  which  the  Grand  Hotel  boulevards." 
stands.  These  "  inner  boulevards  "  were  made  a  few 
years  ago,  upon  the  plan  already  described.  The  old 
buildings  were  all  purchased  and  demolished  at  great 
cost,  and  the  formerly  narrow  street  was  made  straight 
and  broad.  The  reconstruction  was  accomplished  by 
a  foreign  company,  which  could  not  meet  its  obliga- 
tions to  the  city,  and  failed.  A  large  amount  of  the 
property  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  municipal  corpora- 
tion, which  became  a  landlord  on  an  extensive  scale, 
and  which,  as  perhaps  many  of  the  subsequent  guests 
did  not  know,  owned  the  Grand  Hotel  itself.  Ant-  Antwerp's 

i  i-ii'  i  •  street  re- 

werp  has  employed  this  same  plan  to  rebuild  and  im-       forms. 
prove  its  central  streets ;  and  so  the  old  and  pictur- 
esque is  disappearing,  and  something  like  Parisian 


228 


MUNICIPAL.  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Brussels  and 
its  gas 
plant. 


Tram-lines 
in  Belgium. 


General  im- 
provements. 


A  projected 
ship  canal. 


Antwerp's 
harbor  facil- 
ities. 


uniformity  and  universality  is  everywhere  the  new 
rule  in  municipal  architecture. 

Brussels,  as  a  modern  municipality  and  a  growing 
commercial  center,  has  many  points  of  interest.  It  is 
developing  rapidly,  and  its  ambition  and  courage  are 
expanding  in  due  proportion.  It  is  one  of  the  few 
large  towns  of  Belgium  or  France  that  have  gone  into 
the  business  of  gas  supply  on  municipal  account.  Its 
gas-works  are  advantageously  operated,  prices  have 
been  reduced,  and  the  net  revenues  are  considerable. 
The  tram-lines  in  all  the  Belgian  towns  are  operated 
by  private  companies  under  strict  regulations,  and 
they  pay  mileage  rates  to  the  municipal  treasuries  for 
use  of  the  streets.  They  are,  as  a  rule,  admirably 
managed,  with  low  fares,  graduated  according  to  dis- 
tance. Marked  improvements  are  everywhere  being 
made  in  such  matters  as  paving,  drainage,  building 
regulations,  and  municipal  amenities  of  various  sorts ; 
but  in  these  undertakings  the  Belgian  towns,  like  the 
French,  are  more  conservative  than  the  G-erman  and 
the  British.  Brussels  has  taken  the  notable  example 
of  Glasgow,  and  the  still  more  recent  example  of 
Manchester,  to  heart,  and  is  seriously  agitating  the 
question  of  a  ship  canal.  This  huge  undertaking 
could  not  fail  to  enhance  the  importance  of  the  Bel- 
gian capital,  and,  as  a  financial  project,  it  seems  en- 
tirely feasible.  Every  ambitious  modern  city  has  its 
future  largely  in  its  own  hands,  and  Brussels  is  intent 
upon  making  itself  great. 

Meanwhile,  immense  sums  have  been  expended  at 
Antwerp  for  the  improvement  of  harbor  facilities,  and 
few  seaport  municipalities  in  Europe  have  since  1880 
exhibited  a  more  determined  or  intelligent  energy. 
Antwerp,  like  Brussels,  is  gaining  population  with 
striking  rapidity.  It  had  120,000  people  in  1862,  and 
more  than  260,000  in  1895.  Brussels  in  1800  had 


THE  BELGIAN  SYSTEM  229 

66,000  people  within  the  walls  (which  are  now  demol-  CHAP.  in. 
ished  and  replaced  by  encircling  boulevards),  and  Growth  of 
there  were  10,000  more  in  the  extra-mural  precincts. 
The  total  population  in  1893  had  reached  500,000,  of 
which  perhaps  200,000  were  within  the  limits  of  the 
ancient  commune  or  inner  city.  Liege,  in  1893,  had 
160,000  people,  as  against  100,000  some  thirty  years 
earlier. 

Although  these  Belgian  cities  are  growing  so  hand- 
some and  Paris-like,  one  regrets  to  find  the  housing 
of  the  poor  so  inadequate.  The  late  M.  de  Lavelaye, 
of  Liege,  once  assured  me  that  while,  in  recent  years, 
much  new  construction  had  added  greatly  to  the  aver- 
age size  and  comfort  of  the  houses  occupied  by  the 
more  fortunate  classes,  there  had  been  little  or  no  new 
building  for  the  poor,  and  small  improvement  in  the 
character  of  their  habitations.  As  in  the  British  cities, 
so  in  the  Belgian  towns,  thousands  of  families  live 
each  in  a  single  room.  The  condition  of  the  ouvriers 
did  not  seem  to  M.  de  Lavelaye  to  be  improving  fast. 
It  was  in  this  vein  that  the  Belgian  economist  dis- 
coursed as  we  inspected  the  handsome  new  rows  in 
Liege  consisting  of  houses  that  cost  about  one  hundred 
thousand  francs  to  build,  on  lots  valued  at  20,000 
francs  — such  establishments  renting  for  about  five 
thousand  francs.  Incidentally,  it  may  be  said  that 
many  well-to-do  people  —  perhaps  nearly  half  of  them 
—  in  Belgian  towns  own  their  houses. 

But  while  the  poor  are  still  overcrowded,  and  hous- 
ing-reforms require  serious  attention,  the  general 
conditions  of  the  Belgian  cities  have  improved  aston- 
ishingly through  the  successful  adoption  of  modern  progreS. 
sanitary  methods.  Thus  the  death-rate  of  Brussels 
in  1876  was  nearly  twenty-five  per  1000,  from  which 
there  was  a  gradual  decline  until  for  the  year  1894  the 
rate  was  18.1.  In  the  face  of  an  exceedingly  rapid 

15* 


230 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Reduced 
death-rates. 


Octroi  abol- 
ished. 


Cheapness  of 
tramway 
fares  and 

small 
articles. 


Freedom  of 
communi- 
cation. 


growth,  the  death-rate  had  fallen  off  about  thirty  per 
cent.  The  Antwerp  death-rate  had  formerly  been  a 
high  one,  but  in  1894  it  was  a  little  less  than  nine- 
teen. Such  figures  speak  eloquently  of  good  munici- 
pal housekeeping  —  that  is  to  say,  of  satisfactory 
water  and  drainage,  public  cleansing,  food  inspection, 
and  vigilance  against  infectious  diseases. 

So  many  things  in  the  local  administration  of  Bel- 
gium being  like  those  of  France,  it  is  worth  while  to 
observe  one  great  point  of  improvement.  Belgium 
abolished  the  octroi  taxes  before  1870  with  the  result 
of  making  some  of  the  commonest  articles  much 
cheaper  in  Belgian  than  in  French  towns.  One  is 
impressed,  indeed,  with  the  cheapness  of  all  small 
articles  in  Belgium.  In  France  the  smallest  coin  in 
usual  circulation  is  the  sou  piece  (five  centimes, 
equivalent  to  one  American  cent,  or  an  English  half- 
penny) ;  but  in  Belgium  copper  coins  of  one  and  two 
centimes  are  in  ordinary  use.  A  newspaper  may  be 
bought  for  two  centimes.  The  tram-line  fares  are 
six  or  eight  centimes  per  kilometer.  School-children 
buy  pencils  and  other  small  articles  at  prices  which 
only  the  small  coins  make  possible.  The  relation  of 
minor  coinage  to  customary  prices  is  worthy  of  more 
study  than  it  has  received.  The  poor  people  of  Bel- 
gium probably  save  in  the  total  a  large  sum  annually 
because  of  the  fact  that  change  can  be  made  to  the 
centime. 

The  substitution  of  other  sources  of  local  income 
for  the  octroi  dues  has  been  accounted  an  economic 
reform  of  great  social  benefit.  In  so  small  a  country, 
where  population  is  so  dense  and  where  good  roads 
and  navigable  waterways  invite  to  easy  traffic,  the 
octroi  system  could  but  cause  great  friction.  Bel- 
gium's comparative  freedom  from  the  strain  of  mili- 
tary expenditure  has  made  it  possible  for  the  central 


THE  DUTCH  SYSTEM 


231 


CHAP.  III. 


Municipal 
councils  con- 
trol schools. 


Also  chari- 
ties, etc. 


government  so  to  adjust  the  taxation  system  as  not 
only  to  permit  but  to  require  the  towns  to  abolish 
their  local  customs  barriers. 

The  educational  methods  of  the  Belgian  towns  are 
in  most  respects  like  those  of  France.  The  schools, 
under  the  Belgian  system,  are  directly  controlled  by 
the  municipal  council,  which  appoints  the  teachers 
and  performs  the  functions  of  a  school-board.  The 
hospital  administration,  the  bureaux  de  bienfaisance, 
and  the  monts-de-piete",  are  also  under  the  authority 
of  the  municipal  council,  which  appoints  their  super- 
vising boards  and  manages  their  finances.  Thus  the 
municipal  councils  of  Belgium  occupy  a  larger  sphere 
of  control  than  those  of  France,  or  even  those  of 
England.  For  the  British  schools  and  poor-relief 
are  administered  by  separate  elective  bodies,  while  in 
France  they  are  in  the  hands  of  appointive  boards. 
In  Belgium,  on  the  contrary,  these  great  branches  of 
local  administration,  like  all  others,  find  their  man- 
agement vested  in  the  one  representative  municipal 
council.  The  provincial  government  exercises  a  con- 
siderable measure  of  supervision  over  the  actions  of 
the  municipalities  and  communes,  not  to  the  end  of 
checking  or  restraining  a  proper  municipal  freedom, 
but  for  the  sake  of  regularity  and  safety.  Decentrali- 
zation has  been  better  realized  in  Belgium  than  in 
France,  although  the  manner  in  which  the  superior 
control  over  local  government  is  exercised  is  similar 
in  the  two  countries. 


The  effect  of  modern  conditions  upon  the  growth 
and  the  grouping  of  population  may  be  studied  in  Town  popu- 

TT   ,,  _      ,     J  .  .  lationin 

Holland  to  great  advantage.     Perhaps  nowhere  else     Holland, 
has  the  rapid  expansion  of  the  towns  been  attended 
with  so  few  embarrassing  results.     The  larger  its 
membership  becomes,  the  more  orderly  and  efficient 


Control  ex- 
ercised by 
provincial 
authorities. 


232 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IIL 


growth, 


Density 
and  social 
progress. 


seems  to  be  the  Netherlander  hive.  For  some  years 
past,  using  round  figures,  there  have  been  150,000 
births  each  year  in  Holland,  and  90,000  deaths,  leav- 
ing a  net  annual  increase  of  60,000.  Emigration  has 
averaged  less  than  5000  a  year,  and  it  has  been  coun- 
ter-balanced by  some  immigration.  Thus  for  the  four 
years  from  the  end  of  1889  to  the  beginning  of  1894 
the  average  net  gain  of  population  was  55,374  per 
annum.  In  the  twenty  four  years  previous  to  Janu- 
ary 1,  1894,  Holland's  population  had  grown  from 
3,579,529  to  4,732,911,— a  gain  of  1,153,382,  or  more 
than  32  per  cent.  Of  this  remarkable  increase,  602,- 
036  people  are  credited  to  the  twenty-one  largest 
towns,  and  551,346  represent  the  gains  of  all  the  rest 
of  the  country.  The  percentage  of  the  total  popula- 
tion belonging  to  the  large  towns  (those  having  more 
than  20,000  people  each)  had  increased  from  26.1  to 
32.5.  But  the  urban  growth  in  fact  was  greater  than 
these  figures  indicate ;  for  much  of  the  gain  outside 
the  large  towns  was  aggregated  in  manufacturing 
suburbs,  and  in  industrial  towns  having  from  10,000 
to  20,000  inhabitants.  The  density  of  the  provinces 
of  North  Holland  and  South  Holland  had  increased 
to  the  remarkable  averages  of  876  and  836.5  per  square 
mile ;  while  for  all  Holland  the  average  was  374. 

With  a  harsh  and  capricious  climate,  and  with  great 
difficulties  in  the  way  of  thorough  drainage  and  a 
satisfactory  supply  of  water,  it  is  nothing  short  of  a 
brilliant  triumph  of  sanitary  science  and  enlightened 
municipal  administration  that  Holland  is  able  to  ac- 
commodate half  a  million  additional  inhabitants  every 
decade,  without  further  aggravating  any  of  the  evil 
consequences  of  overcrowding,  but,  on  the  contrary, 
with  steady  improvement  in  the  average  of  healthful- 
ness  and  of  social  well-being.  The  death-rate  dimin- 


THE  DUTCH  SYSTEM  233 

ishes ;  poverty  and  crime  are  well  controlled ;  educa-    CHAP.  in. 
tion  "becomes  more  universal  and  more  complete,  and, 
in  short,  the  urbanization  of  Holland  seems  not  to 
have  been  attended  with  any  of  those  phenomena  of    Beduction 
physical,  mental,  or  moral  decline  that  have  been  re-     °  rate. 
garded  in  many  quarters  as  inevitable  results  of  the 
growth  of  cities.    For  the  whole  country,  the  average 
yearly  death-rate  in  the  decade  1860-70  was  approxi- 
mately 25  per  1000.    In  the  period  from  1870  to  1880 
it  declined  somewhat.     But  from  1880  to  1890  it  fell 
materially,  and  reached  an  average  of  about  20.    In 
1893  it  was  only  19.1.     But  the  great  city  of  Amster- 
dam, with  a  population  (December  31, 1893)  of  446,657 
not  including  the  suburbs,  reported  for  1893  a  death-      Amster- 
rate  of  only  18.6,  which  was  appreciably  less  than  the  liant  record. 
rate  for  the  whole  of  Holland.    When  a  country's 
chief  city  has  a  death-rate  lower  than  the  rate  for  the 
nation, —  in  the  face  of  the  old  maxim  that  death-rates 
increase  in  a  certain  mathematical  ratio  as  density 
increases, —  then,  surely,  modern  sanitary  improve- 
ments and  administrative  methods  are  vindicated  be- 
yond all  controversy.     To  show  that  the  low  Amster- 
dam rate  promises  permanence,  it  should  be  said  that 
the  report  for  1894  was  still  more  favorable,  the  figures 
being  18.3.    At  the  Hague  in  1893  the  rate  was  19.1, —    The  Hague 
exactly  the  same  as  that  for  the  whole  country ;  but       dam. 
in  1894  the  Hague  rate  dropped  to  16.9.     The  Rotter- 
dam rate  was  21.9  in  1893  and  20.1  in  1894.    Until  a 
very  recent  date,  mortality  in  these  cities  was  at  a  con- 
siderably higher  rate  than  in  the  nation  at  large. 
Birth-rates  for  1894  were  reported  as  follows:  Am- 
sterdam, 31.6 ;  Rotterdam,  35.3 ;  the  Hague,  31.4.    The 
birth-rates  promise  soon  to  be  double  the  death-rates. 
The  population  of  the  seven  largest  towns  at  the 
opening  of  1894,  as  compared  with  their  population 


234  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  in.    ten  years    earlier   and   thirty-two   years   earlier,  is 
shown  in  the  following  table: 


Town  growth 
in  32  years. 

Amsterdam  .... 

Jan.  1,  1894. 
446,657     . 

Jan.  1,  1884. 
.     361,326     . 

Jan.  1,  1862. 
.     268,355 

Rotterdam  

228,597     . 

.     166,002     . 

.     109,402 

Th.e  Hague    

174,790     . 

.     131,417     . 

.       81,993 

Utrecht  

91,070     . 

74,364     . 

54,495 

Gronengen    .    ... 

58,554     . 

49,992     . 

36,112 

Haarlem  

56,803     . 

.       43,961     . 

.       28,145 

Arnhem  .  . 

52,582 

44,436 

26,382 

Within  one  generation  these  Dutch  towns  have 
nearly  or  quite  doubled  their  population.  If  an  area 
large  enough  to  include  the  contiguous  suburbs  were 
brought  into  the  comparison,  it  would  be  seen  that 
Doubled  in  the  population  of  Amsterdam  as  well  as  that  of  the 
°netf0en.era  other  towns  in  the  list  had,  within  a  third  of  a  cen- 
tury, gained  more  than  a  hundred  per  cent.  The  ac- 
tivities that  this  rapid  growth  has  necessitated  on 
the  part  of  the  municipal  governments  may  readily 
be  inferred.  But  the  new  problems  have  been  met 
with  intelligence  and  success. 

The  last  generation  of  Dutch  town-dwellers  were 
habitually  economical  in  the  donnestic  use  of  water. 
For  although  canals  are  everywhere,  and  almost  the 
whole  country  would  seem  in  imminent  danger  of 
submersion  through  the  breaking  of  dykes,  it  is  need- 
less to  explain  that  the  canal  water  is  not  potable, 
oid  and  new  In  the  earlier  days,  drainage  of  every  character  passed 
freely  into  the  water-ways,  and  the  series  of  Amster- 
dam canals,  for  instance,  were  in  fact  so  many  open 
sewers.  But  methods  have  changed.  The  canals 
are  flushed  and  renewed  with  clean  ocean  water,  in- 
troduced from  the  North  Sea  by  an  artificial  channel, 
and  the  sediment  is  constantly  being  dredged.  The 
houses  are  supplied  with  earth  closets,  from  which 
accumulations  are  regularly  and  frequently  removed 
in  tight  receptacles  on  the  well-known  tub  or  pan 


THE  DUTCH  SYSTEM  235 

system  ;  and  the  excrementary  material  is  converted    CHAP.  in. 
into  fertilizers.     The  Amsterdam  drinking-water  sup- 
ply is  introduced  from  the  famous  "  Dunes  "  near 

Water- 

Haarlem,  by  aqueducts  ;  and  with  this  improved  sup-  supplies. 
ply  of  pure  domestic  water  collected  from  the  sterile 
region  of  sand  hills;  with  the  better  disposition  of 
waste  of  all  kinds  ;  and  with  the  improved  means  for 
renewing  water  in  the  street  canals  which  divide 
Amsterdam  into  nearly  a  hundred  islands,  —  the 
fevers  and  the  other  once  prevalent  diseases  have  be- 
come far  less  frequent,  so  that  a  city  which  seemed 
destined  always  to  be  unwholesome  has  now  become 
a  marvelously  healthful  place.  The  Rotterdam  water- 
supply  is  pumped  from  the  river  and  filtered,  while 
waste  materials  are  carried  to  the  farms  as  from  Am- 
sterdam. I  am  informed  that  the  Amsterdam  mu- 
nicipality has  recently  acquired  control  of  the  gas 
plant  and  is  furnishing  its  citizens  with  their  light- 
ing supplies.  But  if  this  be  the  case  it  is  an  excep- 

j.          1  .  f        4.,        r,     ,    i    4  .  1V  Lightingand 

tional  instance  ;  lor  the  Dutch  towns  in  general  have     transit  m 


been  little  disposed  to  embark  in  these  collective 
municipal  undertakings.  Private  capital  and  energy 
have  always  been  abundant  in  Holland,  and  have 
been  allowed  as  a  rule  to  take  the  initiative  in  sup- 
plying such  common  wants  as  light  and  transit.  The 
street  railways  are  numerous  in  the  towns,  and  the 
country  is  intersected  with  steam  tram  lines.  Fares 
are  exceedingly  low,  and  the  facilities  for  local  transit 
and  traffic  are  notably  good.  The  Amsterdam  mu-  pubiicwork 
nicipality  has  achieved  great  things  in  the  develop-  of  dam!*1 
ment  of  harbor  accommodations,  and  the  canal  works, 
bridges,  and  municipal  appointments  in  general,  are 
undergoing  constant  improvement  at  the  hands  of 
skilful  engineers. 

In  1795  the  aggressive  French  republic  made   an 
easy  conquest  of    Holland.      As    in   Belgium,  the 


236 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  III. 

The  French 
regime  in 
Holland. 


Permanent 
results. 


Dutch  con- 
stitutions. 


Administra- 
tive system. 


"rights  of  man"  were  proclaimed,  and  the  new 
French  methods  of  administration  were  promptly 
acquired  by  the  "Batavian  Republic."  The  Napo- 
leonic modifications  were  in  turn  applied  to  the  Neth- 
erlands, and  in  1810  Napoleon  went  so  far  as  to 
incorporate  the  country  with  France,  its  institutions 
being  completely  assimilated.  "With  the  battle  of 
Waterloo  the  French  domination  came  to  an  end ;  but 
nearly  twenty  years  of  modern  French  administrative 
organization,  with  French  civil  and  criminal  codes,  had 
left  an  impression  not  to  be  obliterated.  When  there- 
fore the  kingdom  of  the  Low  Countries,  uniting  Holland 
and  Belgium,  was  formed  in  1815,  it  rested  upon  the 
basis  of  a  written  constitution  which  guaranteed  the 
essential  principles  of  the  French  revolution  of  1789, 
and  which  prescribed  a  framework  of  provincial  and 
municipal  institutions  upon  the  familiar  French 
model.  Subsequent  enactments  have  created  numer- 
ous variations  of  detail;  but  the  French,  Belgian, 
and  Dutch  systems  of  local  administration  are  all 
traceable  to  a  common  origin.  From  1795  to  1815 
they  were  practically  uniform.  In  1830  the  Belgians 
withdrew  from  the  Union  with  Holland,  and  adopted 
a  new  constitution.  Their  minor  organization,  how- 
ever, continued  to  be  very  similar  to  that  of  their 
greatly  respected  Dutch  neighbors.  The  Dutch  con- 
stitution was  revised  and  somewhat  liberalized  in 
]848,  with  a  new  and  comprehensive  municipal  code 
following  two  or  three  years  later.  Again  in  1887 
the  constitution  was  revised,  the  franchise  broadened, 
and  some  changes  of  detail  adopted  in  the  administra- 
tive laws. 

The  outline  of  the  system  of  provincial  and  muni- 
cipal government  may  easily  be  drawn,  and  the  reader 
of  these  pages  will  at  once  perceive  its  similarity  to 
the  French  system,  and  still  more  to  the  Belgian. 


THE  DUTCH  SYSTEM  237 

The  Dutch  provinces  (corresponding  to  the  French  CHAP.  in. 
departments  and  the  Belgian  provinces)  are  eleven  in 
number,  and  the  communes  (in  1894)  are  1123.  Each 
province  has  its  elected  council,  known  as  the  "  Pro- 
vincial States,"  corresponding  precisely  to  the  councils- 
general  of  the  French  departments  and  the  provincial  Provincial 
councils  of  Belgium.  These  bodies  vary  in  size  from  01  ffonf1" 
80  in  the  most  populous  (South  Holland)  to  35  in 
the  least  populous  (Drenthe)  of  the  provinces.  They 
hold  two  sessions  a  year.  They  are  represented  for 
every-day  administrative  purposes  by  a  standing 
committee  of  six  of  their  members,  designated  by  the 
body  itself.  This  executive  committee  is  known  as 
the  "  Deputed  States,"  and  it  holds  the  same  place  in 
provincial  affairs  as  the  deputation  permanente  of 
the  Belgian  provincial  councils,  which  also  consists 
of  six  members.  The  standing  executive  committee 
of  the  French  councils-general,  as  created  by  the  law 
of  1871,  occupies  a  like  position.  In  Holland  an  ap- 
pointed "  Commissioner  of  the  Sovereign  "  represents  The  Royal 
the  central  authority  in  each  province, — correspondin  g  s°io^en 
to  the  provincial  governor  in  Belgium  and  the  prefect 
in  France.  The  commissioner  presides  over  the 
sessions  of  the  Provincial  States,  and  also  over  those 
of  the  executive  committee  of  six,  i.  e.,  the  Deputed 
States,  where  in  case  of  an  equal  division  he  casts  the 
deciding  vote.  While  many  of  his  duties  are  identical 
with  those  of  a  French  prefect,  he  exercises  a  less  domi- 
nant authority.  Provincial  and  municipal  self-rule  in 
the  Netherlands  is  more  complete  than  in  France.  The 
Deputed  States  of  each  province  must  approve  the 
budget  of  all  municipalities,  and  must  always  give  Rprov\nce°f 
consent  before  municipal  property  can  be  alienated. 
Franchises,  important  contracts,  and  some  other  mu- 
nicipal matters  must  also  be  referred  to  the  provincial 
authorities  for  ratification.  But  in  most  of  their 


238  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  m.  ordinary  affairs  the  communes  are  left  to  themselves, 
their  functions  being  regulated  by  the  terms  of  the 
general  law. 

The  municipal  councils  of  all  cities  and  towns  of 
considerable  size  are  composed  of  thirty-nine  mem- 
bers, elected  for  six  years,  thirteen  retiring  every  two 

Councils!1  years.  For  smaller  communes  the  number  is  less,  and 
the  smallest  elect  only  seven  councilors.  The  rule 
for  all  communes,  however,  is  the  six-year  term  and 
the  biennial  renewal  of  one  third  of  the  council.  The 
suffrage  in  Holland  is  much  restricted  by  tax-paying 
qualifications.  Previous  to  1887  the  requirements 
were  so  arduous  that  there  were  only  three  voters  for 

Suffrage  lim-  J 

itations.  every  hundred  people.  At  present  there  is  one  voter 
for  about  fifteen  people  —  a  total  electorate  of  ap- 
proximately 300,000.  Voters  must  be  twenty-three 
years  of  age,  and  must  have  paid  a,  land  tax  of  at 
least  ten  guilders  (about  $4.00),  or  direct  personal 
taxes  of  an  amount  varying  in  different  towns  accord- 
ing to  population.1  So  exclusive  an  electorate  might 
confidently  be  expected  to  choose  substantial  burghers 

Character  of  .    .       ,  .,  ...  , 

councilors,  as  municipal  councilors.  Any  citizen  who  is  twenty- 
three  years  old  is  eligible  to  a  seat  in  the  council, 
whether  he  is  entitled  to  vote  or  not.  But  an  elec- 
toral body  of  tax-payers  would  naturally  fill  the 
council  with  men  of  their  own  class.  The  mayor,  or 
burgomaster,  as  he  is  usually  called,  is  appointed  by 

Theburgo-  .  *.  *  F  .    f 

master,  the  sovereign,  for  a  term  of  six  years.  The  appoint- 
ment is  presumably  made  in  deference  to  the  ex- 
pressed or  understood  wishes  of  the  municipal  coun- 
cil. The  mayor  presides  over  the  council,  and  he  has 

1  Pending  propositions,  advocated  "by  the  government  itself  in 
the  legislative  chambers,  will,  if  adopted,  as  seems  probable, 
fix  the  minimum  age  of  voters  at  twenty-five,  and  greatly  reduce 
the  qualifications,  so  that,  it  is  estimated,  there  will  be  700,000 
voters — more  than  twice  the  present  number. 


THE  DUTCH  SYSTEM 


239 


the  power  to  suspend  its  ordinances  and  resolutions 
for  a  period  of  thirty  days,  in  order  to  allow  the 
deputed  states  of  the  province  time  to  act  as  a  court 
of  appeal  and  settle  the  matter.  The  councils  of 
large  towns  select  from  their  number  four  wetkouders, 
who  constitute  an  executive  committee  with  the 
mayor  as  their  presiding  officer.  In  the  smaller 
towns  only  two  or  three  such  wethouders  are  cho- 
sen. They  correspond  to  the  echevins  of  the  Belgian 
councils,  and  to  the  adjuncts  of  the  French,  though 
possessing  higher  authority  than  their  French  equi- 
valents. They  are  in  general  charge  of  all  the  depart- 
ments of  municipal  administration,  and  exercise  the 
appointing  and  removing  power  over  the  municipal 
officials.  The  police,  however,  are  under  the  mayor's 
personal  control,  by  virtue  of  his  character  as  an 
officer  of  the  State. 

The  Dutch  burgomaster,  though  belonging  to  a 
municipal  system  the  forms  of  which  are  so  much 
more  closely  akin  to  the  French  than  to  the  German, 
is  in  practice  an  official  more  similar  in  status  to  the 
German  burgomaster  than  to  the  French  mayor. 
His  six-year  appointment  is  likely  to  be  renewed 
from  time  to  time,  and  he  is  a  high  and  expert  pro- 
fessional civil  servant,  rather  than  a  citizen  magis- 
trate invested  with  brief  authority.  The  Amsterdam 
burgomaster  being  appointed  not  long  ago  to  a  cabi- 
net position,  the  vacancy  was  filled  by  the  transfer  of 
the  Rotterdam  burgomaster  to  the  executive  chair  of 
the  greater  city.  More  commonly,  however,  the  bur- 
gomaster has  local  affiliations  with  the  town  where 
he  holds  office,  and  vacant  burgomasterships  are 
often  filled  by  the  promotion  of  a  wethouder  or  mem- 
ber of  the  council's  executive  committee.  Practically, 
a  burgomastership  in  the  Low  Countries  is  a  life 
position,  and  it  carries  with  it  much  dignity  and 


CHAP.  III. 


The  "wet- 
houders." 


Appointing 
power. 


Police  con- 
trol. 


Position 

of  the 
Dutch  bur- 
gomasters. 


240 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IIL 


salaries.0 


"agencies, 


honor,  not  to  mention  the  very  adequate  compensa- 
tion that  is  allowed.  Ordinary  councilors,  of  course, 
are  not  paid,  while  wethouders  are  granted  reasona- 
ble salaries. 

The  Dutch  preference  for  private  initiative  is  ex- 
hibited  in  the  school  system,  and  also  in  the  methods 
of  charitable  relief.  While  education  is  very  general 
and  thorough,  it  is  not  the  policy  of  the  country  to 
develop  a  uniform,  free,  compulsory  system  of  ele- 
mentary instruction.  Private  schools  are  subsidized 
by  the  municipalities,  and  public  schools  are  not  wholly 
free.  The  system  resembles  that  of  Great  Britain  in 
many  respects.  The  report  for  1892-93  showed  that 
466,910  pupils  were  enrolled  in  2993  public  elementary 
schools,  and  205,378  in  1331  private  schools.  The  in- 
fant  schools  (kindergartens)  are  chiefly  in  private 
hands,  the  report  showing  80,517  children  in  2550 
private  infant  schools,  and  23,858  in  800  public  schools. 
The  general  government  pays  a  portion  of  the  expense 
of  instruction,  and  in  1892  it  appropriated  nearly 
$2,500,000  on  account  of  primary  education,  while 
the  local  authorities  expended  more  than  $3,500,000. 
There  is  no  such  thing  in  Holland  as  the  levy  of  a  poor 
rate,  and  the  presumption  is  that  private  societies  will 

Charity  and  ,         „  .  __r 

relief.  meet  the  demands  of  charity.  The  communes  grant 
small  subsidies  to  the  benevolent  societies  and  estab- 
lishments, and  suppress  mendicancy  as  criminal.  To 
some  extent  there  are  public  work-houses,  but  the 
State,  the  provinces,  and  the  communes  merely  pro- 
vide such  means  and  establishments  as  are  found 
necessary  to  supplement  private  charitable  effort. 

Certainly  it  is  not  to  Spain  that  the  inquirer  would 
be  sent  for  practical  lessons  in  the  art  of  municipal 
administration.  Yet  Spain,  with  all  its  backwardness 
in  the  general  adoption  of  modern  ideas  and  facilities, 


THE  SPANISH  SYSTEM  241 

should  not  be  wholly  overlooked  even  in  a  survey  of    CHAP.  in. 
the  most  recent  phases  of  progress  in  Continental 
cities.     From  the  standpoint  of  theoretical  organ- 
ization, the  Spanish  legislators  and  administrative 
lawyers  of  the  Liberal  party  have  shown  an  almost  un-     model  ad- 
surpassed  ability  and  knowledge ;  and  they  have  given     statute^6 
their  country  an  administrative  system  —  at  least  on 
paper  —  which  is  perhaps  the  most  perfectly  adjusted 
of  any  to  be  found  in  Europe.     Moreover,  at  points 
where  the  magic  of  modern  commercial  progress  has 
touched  a  Spanish  community,  notably  at  Barcelona, 

•     '     j-1      L  j.i  i  • ,      /»  As  to  practi- 

oue  perceives  that  the  people  possess  capacity  for  mu-  cai  progress. 
nicipal  self-government,  and  have  begun  to  transform 
their  public  services,  revise  their  street  systems,  and 
modernize  their  municipal  establishments  with  as  great 
an  energy  as  can  be  observed  anywhere  else  in  Eu- 
rope, and  with  ready  acceptance  of  the  most  advanced 
methods. 

Spain's  relations  with  the  first  French  Republic  — 
which  resembled  vassalage  rather  than  a  free  and 
equal  alliance  —  did  not  much  affect  the  domestic 
regime  of  political  and  ecclesiastical  absolutism  and 
the  medieval  methods  of  administration.  But  Napo- 
leon, in  1808,  assumed  the  sovereign  authority,  made 
his  brother  Joseph  the  nominal  king,  and  promulgated  ^  spam. 
a  constitution  of  the  clear-cut,  regular  sort  which  was 
operative  in  France.  Uniformity  of  system  was  in- 
troduced, with  complete  centralization.  The  Spaniards 
were  rebellious,  however,  and  in  1813  they  expelled 
the  French.  The  revolutionary  leaders  had,  mean- 
while, in  1812,  framed  a  liberal  constitution  at  Cadiz, 

i-i-«  -i  •  n      r*nr\  i  Constitution 

based  upon  the  French  principles  of  1789,  and  pro- 
viding  for  individual  freedom  and  a  large  measure  of 
local  autonomy.  The  advanced  and  enlightened  mi- 
nority of  the  Spanish  people  were  ready  for  the  mod- 
ern order  of  things.  But  the  ignorant  masses  had  not 

16 


242  MUNICIPAL  GOVEKNMENT.  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  in.  been  permeated  by  the  new  influences ;  and  with  the 
return  of  a  Bourbon  monarch  the  constitution  of  1812 
was  set  aside,  and  the  ancien  regime  was  restored, 
with  its  hideous  accompaniments  of  inquisitorial  per- 
secution. Nevertheless,  the  constitution  of  Cadiz 
held  its  place  as  an  ideal  in  the  minds  of  liberal  and 
educated  men ;  and  in  1836  it  was  restored  for  a  little 
while  by  virtue  of  a  successful  revolution.  In  1837 
the  Cortes  framed  an  excellent  constitution  which  was 

Reforms 

of  1837.  similar  in  most  respects  to  the  Belgian  constitution  of 
1831,  and  which  also  bore  a  resemblance  to  the  French 
constitution  of  1830  under  which  Louis  Philippe  was 
called  to  reign.  The  system  of  provinces  and  com- 
munes,—  with  prefects  and  mayors  for  executive  pur- 
poses, and  with  provincial  and  municipal  councils  for 
deliberation,  with  a  hierarchy  of  control,  and  with  a 
careful  assignment  of  local  jurisdiction, —  was  now 
firmly  established  in  Spain.  But  a  reactionary  move- 
ment in  1845  diminished  the  extent  of  local  freedom, 
while  also  maintaining  heavy  restrictions  upon  the 
elective  franchise. 

The  revolution  of  1868  again  restored  the  progres- 
sives to  power,  and  it  was  followed  by  sweeping  legis- 
lative reforms.     The  constitution  of  1869  was  framed 
„    ^  ...      by  the  national  legislature  after  the  most  protracted 

Constitution       »  ° 

of  1869.  and  careful  deliberation,  involving  a  comparative 
study  of  all  the  constitutional  projects  and  experi- 
ments of  the  century,  whether  European  or  American. 
The  Spanish  documents  of  1812  and  1836  naturally 
formed  the  basis  for  the  new  organic  law.  Individual 
liberties  were  guaranteed,  the  suffrage  was  extended  to 
every  male  citizen  who  had  attained  the  age  of  twenty- 
five,  and  self-government  for  provinces  and  for  mu- 
A  triumph  nicipalities  took  the  place  of  centralization.  It  was 
°  views*  the  most  advanced  of  all  the  European  constitutions 
then  in  operation.  The  contrast  was  the  more  em- 


THE  SPANISH  SYSTEM 


243 


phatic  because  the  highly  centralized  system  of  the 
Second  Empire  was  still  the  law  of  France.  To  this  free 
constitution  the  Italian  Prince  Amadeus, —  called  by 
Spanish  liberals  from  the  fresh  atmosphere  of  reform 
and  progress  in  Italy, —  took  the  oath  of  allegiance 
when  he  ascended  the  throne  of  Spain  in  1870.  Three 
years  later  he  abdicated,  and  the  republic  was  pro- 
claimed, with  institutions  much  more  completely  di- 
vested of  monarchical  traditions  than  those  which  the 
new  French  republic  had  ordained.  But  within  a 
year  a  scion  of  the  Bourbons  was  reigning,  and  after 
the  suppression  of  the  Carlists,  and  the  necessity  of 
a  return  from  the  military  to  the  civil  order  of  gov- 
ernment, a  new  constitution,  that  of  1876,  was  drawn 
up  by  the  ministers  themselves  and  submitted  for 
ratification  to  an  elected  national  assembly.  It  has 
remained  the  organic  law  of  Spain  since  its  proclama- 
tion on  June  30,  1876.  It  was  a  less  advanced  instru- 
ment in  many  respects  than  the  famous  one  of  1869 ; 
but,  nevertheless,  it  was  doubtless  better  adapted  to 
the  actual  conditions  prevailing  in  the  Spanish  nation. 
It  restricted  the  suffrage,  whether  for  local  or  for  na- 
tional elections,  to  citizens  above  the  age  of  twenty-five 
who  had  paid  a  land  tax,  or  an  industrial  tax,  amounting 
to  about  five  dollars  per  annum ;  although  the  priests 
and  members  of  learned  professions,  and  various 
classes  of  public  servants  and  others  presumably  in- 
structed and  intelligent,  were  entitled  to  be  registered 
without  regard  to  the  payment  of  taxes.  Under  these 
qualifications  the  registered  voters  were  about  three 
in  number  for  every  fifty  persons.  It  must  be  re- 
membered that  the  universal  suffrage  of  1869,  as  of 
the  transient  liberal  constitutions  of  earlier  periods, 
had  not  been  demanded  or  appreciated  by  the  masses. 
In  June,  1890,  however,  the  tax-paying  restrictions 
were  abolished,  and  the  voting  lists  now  contain  the 


CHAP.  III. 


Short-lived 
republic. 


Present  oi> 
ganic  law. 


The  elective 
franchise. 


Extensions 
of  1890. 


244  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  in.  names  of  all  male  citizens  above  the  age  of  twenty- 
five  who  have  been  identified  with  a  particular  com- 
mune for  two  years. 

The  constitution  of  1876  did  not  materially  affect 
the  admirable  system  of  municipal  and  provincial 
organization  which  had  been  devised  as  one  of  the 
chief  reforms  resulting  from  the  revolution  of  1868. 
There  are  in  Spain  about  9400  municipal  districts  or 
communes,  and  49  provinces.  The  marked  character- 
istic of  the  Spanish  system  is  the  unreserved  and 
emphatic  manner  in  which  it  proclaims  and  guards 

Local  self-  ^ 

government  the  sovereignty  or  the  communes  and  provinces 
within  the  spheres  of  action  that  are  ascribed  to  them. 
The  general  lines  of  the  whole  administrative  organi- 
zation are  the  familiar  French  lines;  but  a  much 
firmer  stress  is  laid  upon  local  autonomy.  Here 
again,  however,  it  is  well  to  remember  the  difference 
between  institutions  that  have  taken  deep  root  and 
those  that  exist  on  paper.  In  Barcelona  municipal 
autonomy  is  a  realized  fact ;  but  in  many  Spanish 
communes  it  is  far  less  operative  as  a  working  sys- 
tem than  in  the  French  communes,  where  the  average 
intelligence  and  political  experience  of  the  people  are 
so  much  more  highly  developed. 

The  Spanish  province  is  precisely  analogous  to  the 
French  department.  Its  affairs  are  managed  by  a 
representative  body  consisting  of  25  deputies  for 

provinces!  provinces  having  less  than  150,000  people,  the  num- 
ber increasing  according  to  a  graduated  scale  up  to 
40  for  those  of  300,000,  and  to  48  for  those  of  500,000, 
with  one  additional  deputy  for  every  50,000  persons 
in  excess  of  half  a  million.  The  largest  provinces 
actually  have  about  52  members  in  their  legislative 
assemblies.  As  in  France,  Belgium,  and  Holland,  this 
provincial  congress  appoints  a  standing  executive 
committee  from  its  membership,  which  exercises  con- 


THE  SPANISH  SYSTEM 


245 


stant  administrative  authority  over  provincial  affairs. 
These  affairs  consist  of  all  public  matters  distinctively 
affecting  the  province,  and  include  particularly  such  in- 
terests as  roads  and  water-ways,  penal  and  charitable 
institutions,  and  education.  The  national  authority 
is  represented  in  each  province  by  a  "  civil  governor  n 
—  a  functionary  identical  with  the  French  prefect  — 
whose  duty  it  is  to  see  that  the  national  laws  are  en- 
forced, and  that  the  provinces  and  municipalities  con- 
fine themselves  strictly  within  the  limits  of  their 
own  jurisdiction.  The  governor  presides  over  the 
annual  sessions  of  the  deputation  provincial  (the  provin- 
cial assembly)  and  also  over  the  comission  provincial 
(the  standing  executive  committee).  He  may  suspend 
a  decision  either  of  the  assembly  or  of  the  committee, 
in  order  to  refer  it  to  the  central  Council  of  State. 
This  reference  is  merely  to  determine  whether  or  not 
the  provincial  authorities  have  ventured  beyond  their 
lawful  power.  The  governor  has  also  to  represent 
the  State  as  a  supervisor  within  the  province  of  such 
national  matters  as  posts,  telegraphs,  and  other  in- 
dustrial and  economic  concerns  relating  to  the  public 
revenues  and  to  the  political  and  social  order. 

Each  commune,  by  the  suffrage  of  the  registered 
male  citizens  above  the  age  of  25  who  have  been 
domiciled  in  the  place  for  two  years,  elects  a  munici- 
pal council  (ayuntamiento)  for  four  years,  one  half 
of  which  retires  every  two  years.  Election  is  by 
general  ticket,  and  the  number  of  councilors  (called 
regidores  or  concejales)  varies  from  five  in  the  small 
country  communes  to  thirty-nine  in  the  largest  towns. 
The  entire  municipal  authority  is  vested  in  this  coun- 
cil. It  proceeds  to  designate  one  of  its  own  members 
as  alcalde  (a  term  equivalent  to  mayor),  who  presides 
over  the  body  and  is  the  chief  executive  officer  of  the 
commune.  In  the  larger  towns  the  alcade  is  assisted 


CHAP.  III. 


The  "  civil 
governor." 


Election  of 
municipal 
councils. 


The  alcalde 
and  his  ex- 
ecutive as- 
sistants. 


1C* 


246  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  in.  by  several  tenientes  alcaldes,  who  form  an  administra- 
tive corps  altogether  analogous  to  the  mayor's  ad- 
juncts in  a  French  municipal  government.  The  pro- 
vincial authorities  do  not  hold  the  municipalities 
in  tutelage,  but  they  exercise  an  oversight  aimed  to 
keep  the  communes  from  exceeding  their  powers  or 
committing  irregularities.  Thus  the  system  as  a 
whole  is  a  finely  balanced  one,  and  is  very  creditable 
to  the  scientific  attainments  of  the  Spanish  publicists 
and  law-makers. 

The  municipal  councils  exercise  a  very  complete 

Complete-  *  .  J 

ness  of  mu-  range  of  local  authority.  The  minor  courts  of  justice 
thority.  are  municipal  tribunals,  and  came  under  the  juris- 
diction of  the  councils.  The  municipal  justices  of  the 
peace  have  charge  for  the  State  of  the  registers  of 
births  and  deaths,  and  perform  the  civil  ceremony  of 
marriage.  They  also  act  as  courts  of  conciliation 
in  disputes  of  all  kinds.  Private,  ecclesiastical,  and 
endowed  charity  in  Spain  occupies  a  more  important 
place  than  public  charitable  administration.  But  the 
municipal  councils  are  in  full  control  of  a  large 
amount  of  charitable  work,  and  supervise  the  accounts 
of  private  hospitals  and  institutions.  General  super- 
vision is  also  exercised  by  the  national  and  provincial 
authorities,  the  secular  system  gradually  superseding 
the  traditional  religious  establishments.  Primary 
instruction  is  one  of  the  chief  concerns  of  the  muni- 
cipal councils,  the  general  law  requiring  the  universal 
system,  maintenance  of  schools,  and  making  it  obligatory 
upon  every  alcalde  to  see  that  all  children  in  the 
commune  are  enjoying  either  public  or  private  in- 
struction. But  while  the  school  system  has  been 
greatly  improved  in  recent  years,  the  compulsory 
universal  education,  on  a  uniform  plan,  as  ordained 
by  law  in  1857,  has  never  been  well  enforced.  Soon 
after  the  enactment  of  that  law,  only  twenty  per  cent. 


THE  SPANISH  SYSTEM 


247 


of  the  population  could  read  and  write.  This  pro- 
portion has  increased  to  perhaps  thirty  per  cent. 
Efficient  self-government  must  await  a  higher  average 
degree  of  intelligence. 

The  present  sanitary  state  of  Spanish  towns  helps  us 
to  understand  the  conditions  that  prevailed  elsewhere 
in  Europe  half  a  century  ago.  Reforms,  it  is  true, 
have  been  instituted  in  some  of  the  more  progressive 
cities,  but  the  high  death  rates  and  the  prevalence  of 
preventable  diseases  point  unerringly  to  the  general 
neglect  of  scientific  means  for  the  protection  of  the 
public  health.  The  average  death  rate  for  all  Spain 
has  for  several  decades  been  approximately  30  per  1000, 
while  the  rate  for  the  large  towns  has  been  consider- 
ably higher.  In  Barcelona,  however,  the  rate  for  1894 
did  not  exceed  twenty-nine;  and  the  Madrid  rate, 
which  in  the  seventies  was  wont  to  approach  forty, 
has  of  late  been  nearer  thirty.  This  means,  in  the 
case  of  both  towns,  that  water-supply,  drainage,  pub- 
lic cleansing,  and  kindred  agencies  affecting  health, 
have  been  made  somewhat  more  satisfactory,  and  that 
the  measures  used  for  controlling  epidemic  maladies 
are  greatly  improved.  In  Portugal,  which  has  made 
still  less  progress  than  Spain  in  modern  methods,  the 
mortality  rates  are  higher, —  at  Lisbon,  for  example, 
the  1894  rate  being  36,  while  at  Oporto  the  rate 
was  45.5. 

The  population  of  Spanish  towns  as  a  rule  has  not 
grown  very  rapidly  of  late,  although  the  two  largest 
ones,  Madrid  and  Barcelona,  are  exceptions.  The 
census  of  1877  reported  397,690  as  the  population  of 
Madrid,  while  that  of  1887  enumerated  470,283,  and 
the  number  for  1894  was  estimated  at  510,000.  Bar- 
celona is  very  conspicuous  among  the  examples  of 
recent  European  municipal  expansion.  In  1877  it 
had  249,106  people,  and  the  number  was  272,481  in 


CHAP.  III. 


Sanitary 
condition. 


High  death- 
rates. 


Compared 
with  Por- 
tugal. 


Growth  of 
Spanish 
towns. 


248 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  III. 


Aggrandize- 
ment of  Bar- 
celona. 


1887,  while  in  1894  the  estimate  was  430,000.  It  is 
expected  that  the  twenty  years  from  1877  to  1897  will 
show  a  doubling  of  Barcelona's  population.  This 
rapid  growth,  moreover,  has  been  attended  by  ambi- 
tious projects  for  the  aggrandizement  of  the  town, 
and  no  city  anywhere  has  a  more  uncompromisingly 
modern  aspect  in  its  new  quarters.  The  harbor  of 
Barcelona  is  wholly  artificial,  and  its  creation  and 
improvement  form  a  signal  instance  of  municipal 
energy.  The  water-supply  is  of  excellent  character 
and  has  recently  been  introduced  from  neighboring 
mountain  sources.  Madrid,  which  is  also  showing 
activity  in  the  creation  of  modern  suburbs,  derives 
water  from  the  Lozoya,  by  an  aqueduct  thirty-two 
miles  long.  Other  Spanish  towns,  Valencia,  Malaga, 
and  even  Seville,  in  some  regards  show  sisrns  of 

Other  Span-  .  °  .& 

ish  towns,  awakening  and  progress  under  the  common  impetus 
of  the  age ;  but  for  our  purposes  they  are  instructive 
chiefly  for  the  contrasts  they  supply  when  brought 
into  comparison  with  the  most  advanced  communities 
of  other  countries. 


Water- 
supplies. 


CHAPTER  IV 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


Modem  as- 


REGARDED  as  modern  municipalities  the  Italian 
cities  had  not  until  a  very  recent  date  enjoyed  a 
good  reputation.  Some  of  them,  at  least,  had  been 
notorious  for  the  overcrowding,  in  garrets  and  in 
reeking  sub-ground  residences,  of  their  shoals  of  ill- 
conditioned,  unemployed  plebeians  ;  for  the  frequency 
of  epidemics  and  the  lack  of  efficient  sanitary  ad- 
ministration ;  for  their  foul  and  narrow  passages  and 
the  bad  odors  that  indicated  the  lack  of  systematic 
scavenging,  —  and  in  short  for  an  almost  complete 
dearth  of  enterprise  in  the  direction  of  modern  muni- 
cipal arrangements  and  undertakings.  To  what  ex- 
tent this  reputation  was  deserved  we  need  not  inquire 
very  carefully.  Perhaps  the  almost  crushing  splen- 
dors of  Roman  and  Italian  history,  and  the  imposing 
character  of  much  that  remains  to  us  of  the  old  art 
and  architecture,  have  by  contrast  deepened  the  un- 
favorable impression  that  contemporary  conditions 
of  life  in  Italian  cities  have  evidently  made  upon  the 
minds  of  visitors  in  general.  If  the  simple  facts  were 
to  be  compared  impartially,  it  would  certainly  appear 
that  in  the  large  English  and  Scotch  towns  previous  to 
1870  the  squalor,  overcrowding,  bad  sanitation,  and  compared 
general  inadequacy  of  municipal  appointments  were  al-  wltto^ls 
most  as  prevalent  as  in  those  of  Italy.  And  the  Italian 
cities,  moreover,  might  well  have  urged,  in  extenua- 

249 


contrast.0 


250  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  tion  of  their  plight,  the  facts  of  decline  in  relative 
wealth  and  importance,  of  commercial  and  industrial 
stagnation,  and  of  protracted  political  adversities; 
while  the  British  towns  were  growing  in  wealth  and 
numbers,  and  might  with  wisdom  and  forethought 
have  made  their  public  arrangements  keep  pace  with 
the  advance  of  commercial  prosperity.  But  whatever 
the  extenuating  circumstances,  the  fact  remained  that 
the  Italian  cities  were  in  a  condition  which  the  sani- 
Tardmess  in  tary  scientists  and  the  municipal  reformers  could  but 
form.  deplore.  The  British  and  German  as  well  as  the 
French  cities  had  at  length  undertaken  notable  re- 
forms in  their  physical  appearances  and  conditions  — 
widening  streets,  demolishing  unwholesome  buildings, 
constructing  improved  drainage  systems,  and  provid- 
ing in  various  new  ways  for  the  social  well-being ;  and 
when  the  visitor  who  had  observed  these  matters  at- 
tentively went  to  Italy,  it  was  true  that  he  found 
reform  more  tardy,  or  at  least  more  superficial. 

I  am  aware  that  to  some  people  it  seems  a  sacrilege 
to  discourse  of  the  common-school  system,  the  new 
building  regulations,  the  drainage  and  the  ward  poli- 
tics of  immortal  Rome.  I  remember  the  rude  shock 
that  I  once  gave  to  the  sensibilities  of  some  very  in- 
telligent travelers  at  the  dinner-table  of  a  Roman 
pension  by  the  innocent  remark  that  I  had  spent  the 
day  not  in  the  galleries  or  churches  but  in  watching 
the  repaving  of  a  street  and  the  construction  of  the 
main  sewer  tunnel  of  a  rapidly-building  new  residence 
neighborhood,  and  in  admiring  the  splendid  new  re- 
ciaimsofthe  taining  walls  and  bridges  of  the  Tiber.  But  certainly 
population  the  people  now  living  are  entitled  to  some  considera- 
tion ;  and  the  nearly  half  a  million  residents  of  Rome 
cannot  be  expected  to  live  wholly  upon  their  pleasure 
in  medieval  art,  or  their  pride  in  archeological  re- 
mains. It  is  inevitable  that  they  should  think  it 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OP  ITALIAN  CITIES  251 

their  right  and  duty  to  make  Rome  as  modern  a  city    CHAP.  iv. 
as  possible,  so  far  as  its  health,  comfort,  and  advan- 
tages for  residence  and  business  are  concerned. 

Fortunately,  the  more  recent  European  improve- 
ments have  nowhere  been  made  in  the  spirit  of  van- 
dalism. It  has  been  alleged  that  the  Coliseum  was 
plundered  and  ruined  to  build  St.  Peter's  and  the  AS  to 
Vatican ;  and  the  churches  and  palaces  of  papal  vandalism. 
Rome  were  in  very  large  part  built  with  materials 
torn  from  the  noble  temples  and  stately  monuments 
of  Roman  Rome.  But  it  belongs  to  the  new  spirit 
of  improvement  to  preserve  and  properly  guard  every- 
thing of  real  archeological  value;  so  that  the  mod- 
ernization of  Rome,  by  men  who  believe  that  their 
city  has  a  living  future  as  well  as  an  historic  past, 
strives  to  obliterate  no  worthy  monument  of  anti- 
quity, but  on  the  contrary  has  not  spared  pains  or  Preservation 

A      j-  .3  ,1      ofantiqui- 

cost  to  discover,  preserve,  and  render  instructive  and  ties. 
intelligible  all  that  has  escaped  the  vandalism  of  the 
intervening  centuries.  And  so  I  must  plead  guilty 
to  sympathy  with  much  that  is  proposed  for  freshen- 
ing and  renovating  this  ancient  capital  of  the  world, 
and  for  making  it  a  fit  place  for  its  people  to  li ve  in. 
The  Capitoline  Hill  has  its  much-frequented  museum 
of  antiquities,  and  its  thrilling  memories  of  a  glorious 
past;  but  it  is  also  the  seat  of  a  modern  municipal 
government  that  is  making  bold  endeavors  for  the 
present  and  large  plans  for  the  future  of  the  citv.  Municipal 

.    .  .  offices  on  the 

The  bureau  of  municipal  statistics  ought  not  to  be  capitoiine. 
deemed  the  least  interesting  thing  on  this  historic 
hill;  for  its  weekly  bulletins  demografico-meteorico, 
recording  births,  marriages,  deaths,  and  the  meteoro- 
logical phenomena  of  the  week,  all  according  to  the 
most  approved  comparative  methods,  are  reminders 
that  Rome  still  lives.  As  for  the  visitors  who  have 
been  wont  to  find  "  picturesqueness "  at  Naples  in 


252  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  those  conditions  that  are  so  frightfully  destructive  of 
life  and  so  preventive  of  the  real  advance  of  the  city, 
and  who  deprecate  the  sweeping  changes  in  progress 
there,  let  us  believe  that  they  are  ignorant  and 
thoughtless,  rather  than  deliberately  inhuman.  The 
material  circumstances  which  have  enveloped  the 
lives  of  at  least  two  hundred  thousand  of  the  five 

Housing     hundred  thousand  people  in  Naples  are  appalling. 

conditions  .      .        ,  n         . 

at  Naples.  Family  lire  in  one  room  as  we  see  it  in  thousands  of 
instances  in  all  large  cities  is  deplorable  beyond  ex- 
pression. But  what  then  can  be  said  of  the  life  of 
two  or  three  families  in  a  single  room,  instances  of 
which  are  not  uncommon  in  Naples, —  and  in  rooms, 
moreover,  that  are  often  too  damp  and  foul  for  any 
animal  life  of  a  higher  order  than  reptiles  ?  There  is 
no  other  remedy  for  these  conditions  and  their  terri- 
ble consequences,  except  wide-spread  demolition  and 
reconstruction  under  public  auspices.  But  to  employ 
such  a  remedy  may  well  mean  an  awakening  and  a 
new  energy  that  have  in  themselves  the  promise  of 
great  progress  along  every  line.  What  Naples  is  do- 
ing and  proposing  to  do,  I  shall  indicate  in  subsequent 
paragraphs. 

It  may  be  well,  however,  first  to  give  a  summary 
of  the  system  of  municipal  government  now  ex- 
isting in  Italy.  Such  a  statement  will  be  the  more 
acceptable  in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  whole  mecha- 
nism of  local  and  provincial  administration  has  been 
revised  and  reenacted  in  a  codified  form  by  legislation 

Italy's  new    approved  in  a  royal  decree  of  February  10,  1889. 

m"ode?a  This  important  law  is  an  excellent  example  of  the 
clear  and  scientific  legislation  which  is  so  creditable 
to  the  new  Italian  kingdom,  and  which  is  doing  so 
much  to  complete  the  work  of  actual  unification  of 
the  provinces.  The  general  scheme  of  provincial  and 
municipal  government  in  Italy  is  similar  to  that  in 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  253 

France  and  Belgium,  and  its  genesis  may  be  readily    CHAP.  iv. 
traced  to  French  connections  with  the  northern  prov- 

General 

inces.    It  differs,  however,  in  many  details ;  and  with     scheme  of 

,.„       ..  .  *        .,  -,  municipal 

its  recent  modifications  it  may  be  said  to  show  more  organization, 
respect  than  the  present  French  system  for  the  princi- 
ple of  local  self-government.  Like  France  and  Bel- 
gium, Italy  is  divided  into  provinces  which  are  sub- 
divided into  communes.  Each  commune,  whether  a 
rural  neighborhood  or  a  great  city,  has  the  same 
framework  of  government, —  that  is  to  say,  each  has 
its  elective  council  (consiglio),  its  standing  executive 
committee,  known  as  the  junta  (giunta),  and  its  mayor 
or  syndic  (sindaco).  There  are  no  special  charters, 
each  municipality  coming  under  the  terms  of  the 
general  law. 

The  communes  of  more  than  250,000  inhabitants 
have  each  a  council  of  eighty  members;  and  this 
number  is  graded  down  through  five  classes  to  fifteen  of  councils. 
for  communes  having  less  than  3,000  people.  The 
giunta,  or  standing  executive  committee,  is  elected 
by  the  council  from  its  own  members,  and  is  com- 
posed of  ten,  eight,  six,  four,  or  two  members,  accor- 
ding to  the  size  of  the  commune.  The  sindaco,  or 

.,.,„„  .        Giuntas  and 

mayor,  is  also  elected  by  the  council  itself  from  its  smdacos. 
own  number,  in  communes  that  have  a  population  of 
at  least  ten  thousand,  or  that  are  the  chief  towns  of 
provinces  or  departments.  In  the  smaller  communes 
the  sindaco  is  designated  from  the  membership  of  the 
council  by  the  king  nominally,  being  actually  selected, 
of  course,  through  the  prefects  and  subprefects  of  the 
departments,  who  are  supposed  to  nominate  in  def- 
erence to  the  opinions  of  the  commune. 

The  communal  franchise  differs  in  Italy  from  the  _ 

*  Voting  quali- 

general  or  parliamentary  franchise.  By  the  law  of 
1882  the  parliamentary  electoral  lists  include  persons 
who,  after  meeting  the  indispensable  preliminary 


254  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  conditions  of  being  male  citizens  fully  twenty-one 
years  old  who  can  read  and  write,  are  either  tax- 
payers to  the  amount  of  about  four  dollars  a  year,  or 
else  are  inscribed  by  virtue  of  two  years'  army  service, 
or  of  holding  certain  positions — official,  educational, 
or  professional — specified  in  the  law.  The  general  lists 
thus  made  up  include  one  person  in  eleven  or  twelve 
of  the  population.  For  the  communal  franchise  the 
general  electoral  lists  hold  good,  but  they  are  ex- 
tended to  include  smaller  tax-payers,  and  also  to  in- 
clude occupiers  of  premises  having  a  rental  value  that 
is  graduated  according  to  the  population  of  the  com- 
mune. Thus,  in  communes  having  150,000  people, 
the  limit  of  rental  value  is  fixed  at  forty  dollars  a 
year,  and  it  is  diminished  to  one  tenth  of  that  amount 
illiteracy  an  in  communes  which  have  less  than  1000  people.  The 

absolute  dis-  .          .  7 

qualification,  really  effective  disqualification  is  that  of  illiteracy. 
No  amount  of  tax-paying  can  procure  the  franchise 
for  the  man  who  is  unable  to  read  and  write.  On 
the  other  hand,  there  are  few  literate  citizens  who 
cannot  be  enrolled  by  virtue  of  tax-payments,  of 
house  occupancy,  or  of  two  years'  army  service.  Fully 
sixty  per  cent,  of  the  adult  population  of  Italy  is 
illiterate ;  and  of  male  citizens  of  voting  age  at  least 
fifty  per  cent,  belong  to  that  category.  The  other 
requirements  can  therefore  have  had  comparatively 
other  re-  little  effect  in  restricting  a  franchise  which  admits 
important,  to  the  electoral  rolls  the  names  of  more  than  one 
twelfth  of  the  total  population.  This  absolute  educa- 
tional restriction  has  existed  hitherto  in  no  other  Eu- 
ropean country ;  but  its  reasonableness  is  hardly  to  be 
disputed.  If  it  had  been  adopted  in  France  by  the 
founders  of  the  present  republic  the  advantage  would 
have  become  evident.  It  is  enough  here,  however,  to 
say  that  the  electoral  bodies  in  the  Italian  communes 
include  practically  all  the  men  who  can  read  and  write. 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OP  ITALIAN  CITIES 


255 


An  illiterate  father  has  the  right  to  delegate  to  his  liter- 
ate son  his  tax-paying  qualification,  and  in  this  and 
several  other  ways  family  representation  is  often  se- 
cured at  the  polls  through  the  delegation  of  the  prop- 
erty rights  of  wives  or  parents. 

Municipal  councilors  are  chosen  for  five  years,  and 
one  fifth  of  the  body  is  renewed  annually,  the  vacan- 
cies being  filled  upon  general  ticket  (scrutin  de  liste) 
by  all  the  voters.  In  communes  of  more  than  ten 
thousand  inhabitants  the  law  provides  that  the  elector 
shall  vote  for  only  four  fifths  as  many  names  as  there 
are  councilors  to  be  elected.  Fractions  are  counted 
as  integers,  and  thus,  for  example,  in  a  city  having  a 
council  of  sixty  members  and  filling  twelve  places 
annually,  the  individual  elector  would  be  entitled  to 
vote  for  a  list  of  ten.  This  device  for  the  benefit  of 
minorities  is  not  without  merit.  It  should  be  added, 
however,  that  in  the  case  of  the  large  communes  the 
law  permits  division  into  frazione,  or  wards,  with  ap- 
portionment of  representation  in  the  council. 

The  full  council  is  a  deliberative  rather  than  an 
administrative  body,  and  it  has  only  two  "  ordinary " 
sessions  in  the  year, —  one  in  the  spring  and  the  other 
in  the  autumn, —  these  sittings  extending  through  a 
number  of  days.  "Extraordinary"  sessions  can  be 
called  at  any  time  by  the  sindaco,  by  the  giunta,  or 
by  one  third  of  the  members  of  the  council.  In  prac- 
tice the  councils  of  the  large  cities  meet  with  consid- 
erable frequency  and  regularity. 

The  ordinary  government  of  the  commune  is  in  the 
hands  of  the  giunta,  or  standing  executive  committee 
of  the  council.  The  members  of  this  committee  are 
chosen  for  two  years,  one  half  of  them  being  appointed 
annually.  The  sindaco  presides  over  their  meetings 
as  he  does  over  those  of  the  full  council.  This  select 
body  has  also  the  appointing  power,  and  is  regarded 


CHAP.  IV. 


Delegation 

of  property 

rights. 


The  general 
ticket  plan. 


A  device  for 
minorities. 


Council 
meetings. 


The  giunta 
and  its 
duties. 


256 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IV. 


The  mayor. 


Required 
functions  of 
the  com- 
munes. 


Optional 
tasks. 


The  octroi 

and  other 

revenue 

sources. 


as  "  the  government "  of  the  commune.  In  the  largest 
cities, —  Naples,  Rome,  Milan, —  the  giunta  consists  of 
ten  members  and  four  substitutes.  In  cities  of  the 
next  grade  there  are  eight  members,  and  the  number 
decreases  to  two  for  the  communes  having  less  than 
three  thousand  people.  The  giunta  is  accountable  to 
the  full  council,  and  all  its  doings  are  carefully  re- 
ported and  reviewed.  The  council  elects  from  its 
own  numbers  the  sindaco,  or  mayor,  for  a  term  of 
three  years.  He  is  at  once  an  official  representing 
the  general  government  and  the  chief  executive  of 
the  commune,  his  double  character  thus  being  the 
same  as  that  of  the  French  mayors  or  the  Belgian 
burgomasters. 

The  law  makes  it  obligatory  upon  the  authorities  of 
every  commune  to  provide  each  year  for  the  cost  of 
maintaining  the  administration;  for  keeping  the  regis- 
ters of  the  State,  showing  births,  deaths,  marriages, 
electoral  lists,  army-service  rolls,  etc. ;  for  the  main- 
tenance of  elementary  schools ;  for  the  ordinary  pub- 
lic works,  such  as  streets,  edifices,  and  aqueducts; 
for  cemeteries ;  for  illumination ;  for  a  certain  amount 
of  medical  and  sanitary  service ;  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  local  police ;  for  jails  and  police  courts,  and  for 
other  ordinary  and  suitable  objects ;  while  it  is  left  op- 
tional with  the  communes  to  enter  upon  various  addi- 
tional undertakings,  the  approval  of  the  provincial 
authorities  being  requisite,  as  a  rule,  for  new  or  ex- 
traordinary projects. 

As  in  France,  the  largest  independent  source  of 
revenue  accorded  to  the  municipalities  is  the  octroi 
taxes  levied  at  the  gates  upon  wines,  building  mate- 
rials and  various  articles  of  ordinary  consumption 
as  they  enter  from  without.  The  source  next  in  im- 
portance is  the  taxes  upon  houses  and  land  added 
for  communal  purposes  to  the  government's  levies. 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  257 

These  imposts  are  extremely  heavy,  often  amounting  CHAP.  iv. 
to  more  than  half  the  gross  rental  value.  I  am  told 
in  Rome  that  the  house  taxes  are  there  equal  to  about 
65  per  cent,  of  the  rents.  A  variety  of  minor  taxes 
and  sources  of  income  complete  the  amount  of  rev- 
enue necessary  to  meet  the  expanding  outlays. 

I  have  indicated  as  succinctly  as  possible  the  main 
features  of  a  municipal  system  that  is  elaborated  with 
great  distinctness  and  detail  in  the  important  new 
piece  of  legislation  to  which  I  have  referred.  Suffice 
it  then  to  add  that  this  uniform  and  modernized 
framework  of  administration  seems  adequate  to  sup- 
port  the  rapidly  increasing  magnitude  and  variety  of 
the  functions  laid  upon  the  government  of  the  Italian 
communities.  For  example,  Italy  had  long  needed  a 
complete  and  efficient  system  of  sanitary  administra- 
tion. Obviously  this  desideratum  could  not  be  ef- 
fected to  the  best  advantage  without  the  aid  of  a  good 
system  of  local  administration  in  general.  For  sev- 
eral years  the  sanitary  specialists  and  the  publicists 
of  Italy  were  studying  and  comparing  the  health  reg- 
ulations of  England,  Germany,  America,  and  other 
countries,  with  a  view  to  the  entire  revision  and 
consolidation  of  the  Italian  laws  pertaining  to  the 
preservation  of  the  public  health.  These  studies 
were  embodied  in  various  legislative  projects,  and  at 
length  took  form  in  a  bill  introduced  by  the  minister 
of  the  interior,  Signor  Crispi,  toward  the  close  of 
1887.  Besides  providing  for  central  and  provincial 
sanitary  authorities,  the  measure,  which  was  duly 
enacted,  made  large  use  of  the  sindaco  and  the 
ordinary  government  of  the  commune  for  the  regu- 
lation of  all  matters  relating  to  the  local  health. 
The  result  now  promises  to  be  that  within  a  few  years 
Italy  may  be  able  to  teach  other  nations  useful  lessons 
in  the  art  of  sanitary  administration. 

17 


258 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  iv. 


tion. 


Street  im- 
provements. 


Central  fa- 
cilities. 


Whatever  may  be  said  in  criticism  of  ruthless 
changes  wrought  by  the  ambitious  municipal  author- 
ities of  other  Italian  cities,  there  can  be  little  com- 
plaint brought  against  Milan  for  the  manner  in  which 
it  has  adopted  the  modern  regime.  It  has  won  the 
right  to  be  enrolled  with  the  well-administered  cities 
of  the  world.  As  the  capital  of  the  prosperous  and  en- 
ergetic Lombards,  its  affairs  have  fortunately  been  in 
the  hands  of  its  most  enlightened  citizens  since  1860, 
when  Lombardy,  with  the  other  north  Italian  prov- 
inces, was  released  from  a  foreign  yoke  and  became 
a  part  of  united  Italy,  under  the  constitutional  rule  of 
Victor  Emmanuel  and  under  an  administrative  sys- 
tem which  had  been  framed  in  the  liberal  mood  of 
1848  for  the  kingdom  of  Sardinia.  It  is  true  that  Milan 
also  was  rich  in  medieval  memories  and  survivals; 
but  comparatively  it  was  not  so  interesting  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  old  conditions  as  many  another 
Italian  town.  Its  ambition  to  become  a  conveniently 
appointed,  a  clean  and  wholesome,  and,  in  short,  a  dis- 
tinctively modern  center  of  nineteenth-century  Europe- 
an activities  has  seemed  to  most  men  to  be  altogether 
reasonable.  Accordingly,  vast  changes  have  been 
wrought,  with  general  commendation.  In  the  period 
from  1860  to  1880  these  took  the  form  chiefly  of  street 
improvements,  similar  to  those  that  were  contempora- 
neously transforming  the  French  towns.  The  changes 
at  Milan  extended  from  the  core  to  the  circumference. 
The  Piazza  del  Duomo  in  front  of  the  cathedral  was 
greatly  enlarged,  and  a  series  of  widened  and  straight- 
ened main  thoroughfares  was  made  to  radiate  from  this 
center  to  all  the  outer  portions  of  the  town,  which  is 
a  fairly  symmetrical  polygon  in  shape.  Street-rail- 
way and  omnibus  lines  were  brought  to  a  focus  at  the 
Piazza  del  Duomo,  which  was  also  joined  with  the 
neighboring  Piazza  della  Scala  on  the  north  by  the  most 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN   CITIES  259 

magnificent  arcades  in  the  world,  and  with  the  ancient  CHAP.  iv. 
Piazza  de'  Mercanti  (almost  adjacent  on  the  west)  by 
broad  streets.  Thus  through  brave  demolitions  and 
wise  rearrangements  Milan  has  created  what  so  few 
cities  possess  —  an  adequate  arterial  center.  The 
city  is  growing  rapidly  in  its  outer  zone,  and  every 
year  demonstrates  more  completely  the  advantages 
of  a  central  receiving  and  distributing  reservoir  for 
the  daily  flux  of  population,  such  as  the  broad  Piazza 
del  Duomo  furnishes,  with  its  dozen  or  more  radi- 
ating thoroughfares  and  its  eight  or  ten  converging 
street-railway  lines.  In  the  Piazza  della  Scala,  entered 
from  the  Piazza  del  Duomo  by  the  vast  and  stately 
arcade  known  as  the  Galleria  Vittorio  Emanuele,  is 
the  medieval  Palace  Marino,  which  was  adapted  in 
1861  to  the  uses  of  the  municipality  as  a  town-hall, 
and  has  continued  to  be  occupied  as  the  home  of  the 
"  municipio."  Here  also  is  the  great  opera  house  of 
Milan,  the  Scala. 

The  partial  rectification  of  the  inner  city's  thorough- 
fares was  accompanied  by  sweeping  achievements  in 

,,  ,     .        ,;.       „      ti  „         ,        ,  Suburban 

the  outer  zone,  and  in  the  further  zone  of  suburbs  changes. 
lying  beyond  the  walls.  The  communal  limits  are 
marked  by  bastioned  fortifications,  which  are  pierced 
by  twelve  or  more  gateways.  Just  outside  the  walls 
is  an  encircling  boulevard  handsomely  laid  out,  with 
a  belt  street-railway  line  which  connects  at  the  several 
gates  with  radial  lines.  Most  of  those  radial  lines 
are  extended  for  some  distance  to  serve  the  outer 
suburbs,  and  the  administrative  municipality  has 
acquired  control  of  the  external  belt.  The  circum- 
ference of  the  engirdling  walls  is  seven  or  eight  miles. 

m,  .       ,    .  ,  if,.,         .  ,          The  girdle 

The  ancient,  innermost  Milan  is  surrounded  by  canals,       lines. 
which  identify  the  course  of  the  old-time  moat ;  and 
along  the  canal  line  is  an  inner  circuit  of  modernized 
streets,  upon  which  it  is  now  proposed  to  operate  an 


260 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


The  Via 
Dante. 


CHAP.  iv.  interior  belt-line  tramway,  crossing  the  radial  avenues 
at  points  about  midway  between  the  Piazza  del  Duomo 
and  the  city  walls.  Eventually  the  external  suburbs, 
which  already  contain  a  considerable  population  — 
and  which  are  all  massed  along  the  encircling  boule- 
vard with  their  chief  agglomerations  at  the  points 
where  the  radials  emerge  from  the  city  gates, —  will 
have  become  so  important  as  to  require  an  unob- 
structed connection  with  the  city  j  and  the  useless 
walls  will  be  doomed. 

Meanwhile,  the  street  reforms  and  the  visible  im- 
provements in  the  ground-plan  of  the  city  are  pro- 
gressing steadily.  As  an  instance  of  the  new  improve- 
ment work  there  should  be  mentioned  the  Via  Dante, 
a  magnificent  radial  very  recently  constructed,  which 
leads  to  the  beautiful  new  park  in  the  northwestern 
part  of  the  city.  There  had  long  been  retained  within 
the  town,  at  the  rear  of  the  old  "Castello,"  a  vast 
military  drill-ground,  extending  from  the  inner  to  the 
outer  lines  of  circuit.  By  consent  of  the  national  gov- 
ernment, the  city  authorities  have  recently  laid  out  a 

A  new  park,  large  part  of  this  space  as  the  chief  park  of  Milan,  and 
an  area  of  perhaps  equal  extent  has  been  arranged  with 
handsome  streets,  and  sold  for  private  residence  sites. 
This  extremely  valuable  land  has  brought  into  the 

An  improve-  municipal  treasury  a  large  fund  of  money,  with  which 

mentfund.  .  *  :      .  / '         . 

a  variety  of  public  improvements  has  been  initiated 
or  authorized.  The  Via  Dante  was  constructed  as  the 
direct  approach  from  the  heart  of  the  city  to  the  curved 
front  of  the  symmetrical  new  park.  It  is  paved  with 
wooden  blocks  on  a  concrete  foundation,  is  lighted 
with  electricity,  and  is  traversed  by  an  electric  street- 
railway.  But  it  is  more  notable  for  its  underground 
construction  than  for  its  beautifully  executed  surface ; 
for,  apart  from  the  main  sewers,  there  are  subways  on 
either  side  of  the  street,  six  feet  high  by  four  or  five 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  261 

feet  wide.    These  subways  adjoin  the  front  founda-    CHAP.  iv. 
tion  wall  of  the  houses,  and  make  it  easy  to  inspect 
and  repair  the  drain-pipes  that  connect  the  houses    convenient 
with  the  sewers.    Within  the  subways  are  placed  the 
water-pipes,  gas-pipes,  electric  wires,  etc;   and  pas- 
sages extend  from  them  to  the  main  sewers.     It  is 
considered  in  Milan  that  no  street  elsewhere  in  Eu- 
rope so  completely  embodies  the  best  principles  of 
construction  —  below  the  surface  if  not  above  —  as  the 
new  Via  Dante. 

When  the  more  recent  plans  for  municipal  improve- 
ment were  adopted,  the  city  government,  with  com- 
mendable forethought,  secured  the  annexation  of  a 
zone  of  suburban  territory  outside  the  wall  of  circum- 
vallation  to  the  average  width  of  perhaps  one  mile,  negation" 
The  so-called  piano  regolatore  —  that  is  to  say,  the  plan 
for  regulating  and  rearranging  the  thoroughfare-sys- 
tem,—  was  thus  made  to  embrace  an  area  very  much 
larger  than  that  of  the  city  proper  as  bounded  by  the 
bastions.  Broad  and  generous  ideas  have  governed 
these  newest  projects  for  the  expansion  of  Milan,  and 
the  suburbs  will  be  well  supplied  with  small  parks, 
tree-lined  avenues,  and  modern  facilities  in  general. 
The  sewer-system  of  the  city  is  now  in  course  of  re- 
construction, a  considerable  mileage  of  modern  con-  The  new 
duits  having  been  added  every  year  since  the  new  sevtm!ys 
system  was  agreed  upon  in  1888.  The  fund  accruing 
from  the  sale  of  the  army  drill-ground,  already  men- 
tioned, gave  the  impetus  to  the  new  sewer-system  as 
well  as  to  other  material  reforms,  and  the  work  is  be- 
ing achieved  in  the  most  satisfactory  manner.  At  an 
earlier  period,  a  swift  stream,  the  Seveso,  had  been 
walled  in  and  covered  over,  and  had  been  made  to 
perform  the  functions  of  a  collecteur  or  principal 
drainage  tunnel.  It  remains  the  central  trunk  sewer, 
and  carries  the  drainage  of  Milan  to  the  Po,  and 

17* 


262  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  iv.  thence  to  the  Adriatic.  It  passes  under  the  Cathe- 
dral Piazza  at  the  heart  of  the  city.  The  new  streets 
are  built  with  proper  sewers,  and  the  older  ones  are 
being  gradually  supplied.  Improved  pavements  and 
sidewalks  form  a  part  of  the  scheme  of  renovation, 
and  the  street-cleaning  system  of  Milan  has  been  de- 
veloped to  a  point  of  very  high  efficiency. 

The  street-railways  have  heretofore  been  under  the 
control  of  a  single  company  whose  charters  expire  in 
1896.  It  has  been  one  of  the  most  efficient  systems 
in  Europe,  and  has  resembled  in  its  equipment  and 
methods  the  best  of  the  American  horse-railway  sys- 
tems. The  fare  in  Milan,  for  an  ordinary  ride  (dis- 
tances being  short  as  compared  with  those  on  Ameri- 
can lines),  is  ten  centimes  (equivalent  to  an  English 
penny  or  two  American  cents).  The  company  had 
long  been  prosperous,  and  the  terms  of  its  charter  re- 
payments to  quired  the  payment  to  the  city  of  about  ten  per  cent, 
sury.  of  its  gross  receipts,  the  yearly  sum  thus  paid  to  the  mu- 
nicipal treasury  having  amounted  for  some  years  past 
to  nearly  three  hundred  thousand  francs.  When  ne- 
gotiations were  recently  entered  upon  for  the  renewal 
of  the  company's  charter  for  another  term  beginning  in 
1896,  it  was  made  a  condition  by  the  city  authorities 
that  various  new  lines  and  prolongations  of  old  ones 
questions,  should  be  built  at  once,  and  that  the  city's  proportion 
of  the  gross  receipts  should  be  increased  considerably. 
The  company  demurred  on  account  of  the  expense  of 
the  new  lines ;  whereupon  the  Edison  Electric  Light- 
ing Company,  which  was  then  furnishing  illumination 
for  some  of  the  public  streets,  made  an  application  for 
the  entire  transit  concession,  proposing  to  substitute 
the  electric  trolley  for  horses,  to  build  as  many  new 
lines  as  the  municipal  government  required,  and  to 
pay  the  city  fifteen  per  cent,  of  the  gross  receipts  after 
the  opening  years,  the  payments  for  a  short  time 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


263 


The  gas 
supply. 


being  at  the  rate  of  ten  or  twelve  per  cent.    The  mu-    CHAP.  iv. 
nicipality  was  favorably  disposed  toward  this  propo-     Electric 
sition,  but  first  desired  an  experimental  test ;  and  tem  fevered. 
accordingly  the  electric  line  was  laid  upon  the  new  Via 
Dante.    It  now  appears  probable  that  horses  will  be 
superseded  by  electricity  for  the  entire  Milan  system. 
The  plan  seems  to  be  to  suspend  the  trolley  wire  from 
cross-wires  attached  to  ornamental  brackets  project- 
ing from  the  houses.     The  overhead  wires  are  not 
condemned  on  the  score  of  their  interference  with  the 
extinguishment  of  fires,  for  the  excellent  reason  that 
disastrous  fires  are  practically  unknown.     The  under- 
ground trolley  would  not  be  feasible  in  Milan  until 
the  new  sewer-system  was  finished. 

The  gas-supply  of  Milan  is  provided  by  an  Anglo- 
French  company  which  had  a  charter  extending  to  the 
year  1910.  That  charter  has  recently  been  extended 
to  the  year  1925  in  consideration  of  a  great  reduction 
in  the  price  of  gas.  The  municipal  government  stip- 
ulated that  the  company  should  make  an  immediate 
reduction  to  private  consumers  from  the  existing 
price  of  forty  centimes  per  cubic  meter  to  twenty-five 
centimes,  with  a  provision  for  further  gradual  reduc- 
tion to  nineteen  or  twenty  centimes.  Still  better 
terms  were  secured  for  the  city  itself  as  a  public  con- 
sumer. Milan  has  also  recently  granted  a  mutually 
advantageous  franchise  to  the  Edison  Electric  Com- 
pany, which  has  a  contract  for  lighting  certain  streets 
and  squares  for  a  period  of  years. 

The  question  of  a  suitable  supply  of  drinking  wa- 
ter has  been  a  serious  one  in  Milan  for  many  years,  The  question 
and  it  has  been  investigated  with  a  rare  patience  and 
intelligence  by  the  municipal  authorities.  Plans  for 
bringing  the  supply  from  the  region  of  lakes  and 
pure  mountain  streams,  at  Como  or  Bergamo,  were 
frustrated  by  the  water  rights  of  industrial  and  irri- 


Electric 
lighting. 


264  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  iv.  gation  companies  along  the  proposed  routes.  Foreign 
engineers  from  a  number  of  countries  joined  in  sub- 
mitting competitive  plans  a  few  years  ago,  and  a 
dozen  interesting  schemes  were  drawn  up.  But  most 
of  these  were  too  expensive  for  practical  considera- 
tion. Two  of  the  schemes,  however,  proposed  driven 
wells,  in  view  of  highly  favorable  geological  condi- 
tions. The  department  of  public  works  sank  a  few 
"  American  tubes"  as  an  experiment,  with  results  that 
were  unexpectedly  satisfactory.  Accordingly,  in 
1890-91  some  large  artesian  wells  were  driven  at  "  the 
Arena,"  adjoining  the  new  park,  and  distribution  was 
begun  upon  a  small  scale.  The  analyses  of  the  water 
Artesian  thus  obtained  have  justified  the  adoption  of  the  driven- 
adopted.  well  system  for  the  entire  supply  of  potable  water; 
and  since  the  quantity  that  may  readily  be  obtained  at 
reasonable  cost  by  this  method  is  unlimited,  the  work 
of  extension  has  gone  steadily  forward.  Heretofore, 
the  Milanese  have  relied  upon  ordinary  well-water  for 
drinking  and  domestic  uses,  while  the  canal  system 
has  supplied  ample  amounts  of  water  for  street-clean- 
ing and  industrial  purposes. 

For  some  years  past  there  has  been  constant  in- 
spection of  the  common  wells,  in  order  to  guard  against 
infection  j  and  they  are  being  gradually  closed  as  the 
new  supply  is  extended.  The  complete  use  of  the 
artesian  water  will  reinforce  a  sanitary  system  that 

Sanitary  .  J      J 

vigilance  has  much  to  commend  it  in  other  respects.  The  mu- 
nicipal laboratory  as  administered  in  Milan  is  an  ad- 
mirable public  agency.  The  service  of  disinfection  is 
highly  praised,  and  all  the  new  methods  by  which 
the  health  of  communities  may  be  protected  are 
ardently  studied  and  applied  by  the  sanitary  authori- 
ties. The  unsanitary  modes  of  life  of  the  masses  of 
the  laboring  population  are  not  to  be  wholly  reformed 
in  a  single  generation;  and,  moreover,  while  the  de- 


RECENT  PEOGEESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


265 


molitions  and  reconstructions  have  done  much,  to 
improve  the  worst  slums,  the  housing  conditions  of  the 
inner  city  remain  to  a  large  extent  unwholesome. 
And  thus  the  death-rate  is  still  higher  than  that  of 
a  few  of  the  best  communities  of  other  countries. 
Nevertheless,  the  rapid  population-growth  of  the  past 
twenty-five  years  has  had  the  benefit  of  improved 
building  regulations ;  and  the  average  social  condition 
of  the  Milanese  has  been  wonderfully  improved.  Be- 
fore 1880,  the  Milan  death-rate  regularly  exceeded  30 
per  1000,  and  in  some  years  it  was  much  higher  than 
that.  Since  1890  it  has  been  strikingly  lower,  and  in 
1894  it  reached  the  exceptionally  low  figure  of  21. 
The  population,  meanwhile,  had  grown  from  about 
330,000  at  the  opening  of  1884  to  about  430,000  on 
January  1,  1894, —  a  gain  of  30  per  cent,  in  ten  years. 
The  statistical  work  of  the  municipal  government  is 
exceedingly  thorough,  and  its  relation  to  the  public- 
health  services  is  very  important. 

It  is  well  known  that  religious  questions  have  in- 
terfered with  the  rapid  development  of  a  system  of 
free,  secular  public  schools  in  the  Italian  towns.  But 
the  Milan  municipality  has  accomplished  much  in  the 
educational  field  within  a  comparatively  short  time. 
Many  new  school  buildings  have  been  erected  since 
1880,  and  nearly  a  thousand  teachers  are  employed  in 
the  free  public  schools,  31,276  pupils  being  enrolled 
in  1892,  with  several  thousand  more  in  the  evening 
classes.  The  municipal  government,  moreover,  main- 
tains an  admirable  series  of  technical  schools  and 
special  institutions,  besides  normal  schools  and  the 
regular  high  schools. 

It  is  pleasant  to  be  assured  that  in  all  the  vigorous 
activities  which  mark  the  municipal  government  of 
Milan,  the  foremost  citizens  take  the  leading  part. 
The  giunta  is  composed  of  men  of  the  best  qualifica- 


CHA.P.  IV. 


Slum  con- 
ditions. 


Decline  in 
death-rate. 


Population. 


Statistical 
work. 


Progress  of 
education. 


Technical 
schools. 


266 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  iv. 


actero/' 


Elections. 


Turin  and 

Genoa. 


tions,  who  as  a  rule  possess  wealth  and  are  glad  to 
devote  themselves  to  the  affairs  of  the  community. 
In  a  word,  the  aristocratic  element  is  in  executive 
control.  The  council  contains  its  more  popular  ele- 
ments, but  is  representative  of  the  best  classes  in  the 
town.  It  has  its  sprinkling  of  active  business  men, 
lawyers,  architects,  and  engineers;  but,  taking  the 
municipal  government  as  a  whole,  it  seems  to  be 
chiefly  in  the  hands  of  the  "old  families";  and  it 
certainly  commands  the  best  talent  that  the  city 
affords.  In  all  its  large  operations,  involving  the 
making  of  contracts  with  corporations  and  the  ex- 
penditure  of  great  sums  for  public  improvement,  the 
municipal  government  of  Milan  is  said  to  have  kept 
itself  above  so  much  as  the  suspicion  of  jobbery  or 
corrupt  methods  ;  and  its  intelligence  and  good  taste 
have  been  conspicuously  displayed  in  almost  every- 
thing it  has  done  or  sanctioned.  Reelection  of 
councilors  is  quite  usual,  and  the  yearly  municipal 
election,  at  which  sixteen  of  the  eighty  council  seats 
are  filled,  is  seldom  attended  with  much  excitement. 
Thus  in  the  election  of  1892,  the  number  of  voters 
registered  on  the  municipal  electoral  rolls  being  44,- 
594,  there  were  only  14,177  votes  actually  cast,  and 
this  would  appear  to  be  an  average  election. 

The  good  character  of  the  municipal  administra- 
tion of  Milan  is  by  no  means  a  solitary  instance.  I 
am  assured  that  Turin  and  Genoa  also  enioy  the  bene- 
fits  of  honest  and  efficient  city  governments,  and  that 
it  is  the  prevailing  custom  of  the  north  Italian  cities 
to  intrust  their  public  affairs  to  the  direction  of  their 
most  talented  and  prominent  citizens.  This  testi- 
mony seems  to  me  to  be  confirmed  by  such  observa- 
tions and  direct  investigations  as  I  have  been  able  to 
make.  Genoa  has  made  conspicuously  successful 


EECENT  PEOGEESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  267 

efforts  to  improve  her  harbor  facilities,  great  suras  CHAP.  iv. 
having  been  expended  with  resulting  benefits  to  com-  Genoa's  bar- 
merce.  The  location  of  Genoa,  so  closely  hemmed  in  ^reetsd 
by  steep  environing  hills,  has  made  it  difficult  to  mod- 
ernize the  street-system,  although  a  number  of  great 
new  thoroughfares  have  been  opened.  Among  the 
most  recent  improvements  has  been  a  series  of  nota- 
ble connecting  boulevards  following  the  contour  of 
the  suburban  hills,  and  affording  marvelous  sea  views. 
The  route  as  a  whole  is  known  as  the  Via  di  Circon- 
vallazione  a  Monte.  The  growth  of  Genoa  and  its 
suburbs  —  the  total  population  of  which  has  practi- 
cally doubled  in  a  period  of  about  thirty  years  —  has 
necessitated  much  modern  building  in  the  outskirts 
on  the  higher  slopes,  where  air,  water,  and  drainage 
are  far  better  than  in  the  congested  old  town  below. 
And  thus  it  requires  no  special  endowments  of  opti- 
mism to  discover  marked  gains  in  the  average  condi-  °cires^°8 
tion  of  the  people,  while  the  vital  statistics  —  so  elab- 
orately and  thoroughly  recorded  under  the  admirable 
new  sanitary  code  of  Italy — show  unerringly  the 
better  security  of  child-life,  the  lessened  ravages  of 
infectious  diseases,  and  the  decline  in  the  general 
mortality-rate.  I  am  impressed,  as  I  examine  the 
municipal  documents  and  reports  of  Genoa,  with  the 
conscientious  and  thorough  organization  of  all  the 
departments  of  the  city  government.  It  is  evident  sound  ad- 
that  the  finances  are  administered  upon  good  business  ^methods™ 
principles;  that  the  public  works  are  in  the  hands  of 
competent  engineers;  that  the  schools  and  charities  are 
well  conducted,  and  that  the  giunta  knows  how  to 
deal  with  all  the  town's  affairs  in  an  orderly,  well- 
balanced  fashion,  adapting  means  to  ends,  and  shap- 
ing the  municipal  administration  intelligently  toward 
the  best  material  and  moral  progress  of  the  com- 
munity. 


268 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IV. 


Turin's  regu- 
larity. 


Ancient  be- 
ginnings. 


Turin's 
"boom" 
period. 


Reaction  and 
recovery. 


The  new  in- 
dustrial 
era. 


Turin  is  a  larger  city  than  Genoa,  and  a  very  pros- 
perous and  well-conducted  one,  with  regularity  as  its 
distinguishing  quality  in  all  things.  Its  street  sys- 
tem is  as  rectangular  as  any  in  America ;  but  this  is 
not  due  altogether  to  modern  rectifications.  It  seems 
that  Turin  was  laid  out  as  a  new  town  for  a  Roman 
colony  in  the  time  of  the  Emperor  Augustus,  and  that 
it  was  then  inclosed  with  a  rectangular  wall  and  pro- 
vided with  a  checker-board  street  system.  The  ar- 
cheologists  hold  that  the  present  streets  of  the  old 
part  of  Turin  follow  the  lines  marked  out  by  the  civil 
engineers  of  the  Augustan  project.  The  additions  to 
the  original  town  have  been  carried  out  upon  the  rec- 
tangular plan,  with  the  result  of  a  regularity  hardly 
equaled  by  any  other  European  city.  From  1859  to 
1865  Turin  was  the  seat  of  government  of  the  new 
Italian  kingdom.  Nearly  every  one  of  the  chief  cities 
of  Italy  has,  within  a  generation,  experienced  what 
Western  American  towns  term  a  "  boom."  The  boom- 
ing period  for  Turin  was  from  1860  to  1865.  There 
was  much  new  building,  many  modern  public  enter- 
prises were  undertaken,  and  population  grew  apace. 
The  removal  of  the  capital  to  Florence  in  1865  was  a 
sore  disappointment  to  the  citizens  of  Turin,  and  for  a 
little  time  the  population  fell  off,  and  public  and  pri- 
vate enterprise  was  checked.  But  the  good  citizens 
of  Turin,  with  the  vigorous  aid  of  the  municipal  gov- 
ernment, turned  their  attention  more  earnestly  than 
ever  before  to  the  town's  industrial  and  commercial 
development.  Water-power  was  introduced  from  the 
high  lands  in  the  vicinity  as  a  municipal  enterprise, 
and  diversified  manufacturing  began  to  flourish  un- 
wontedly.  In  those  palmy  days  of  its  political  im- 
portance, Turin  had  200,000  people ;  but  after  thirty 
years  it  has  grown  to  nearly  350,000,  and  has  ceased 
to  reflect  with  bitterness  upon  the  loss  it  suffered  in 


RECENT  PEOGEESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  269 

1865.    Its  natural  health  conditions  are  favorable,    CHAP.  iv. 
with  good  water  from  the  mountains  at  hand,  and 
suitable  drainage  provided  by  its  river,  the  Po ;  and 
there  has  been  an  intelligent  adoption  of  sanitary  ad- 
ministrative reforms.      The  death-rate,  which  from  provements. 
1875  to  1885  averaged  about  26,  was  only  21  in  1893 
and  20.6  in  1894.    These  years  were  perhaps  excep- 
tional; but  without  a  doubt  the  improved  public 
methods  have  resulted  in  a  permanent  reduction  of 
mortality. 

With  the  transfer  of  the  seat  of  government,  the 
speculative  wave  of  modern  change  and  expansion, 
which  had  enveloped  Turin  in  the  period  from  1860 
to  1865,  passed  on  to  Florence.  The  metamorphosis  Florence  and 
which  followed  in  the  years  1865-71  attracted  far  morphosis. 
more  comment  than  the  changes  which  had  come 
about  at  Turin  or  Milan,  for  obvious  reasons.  Flor- 
ence was  a  smaller  city,  with  comparatively  slight  in- 
dustrial importance,  but  with  a  marvelous  wealth  of 
historic  associations  and  of  surviving  medieval  art 
and  architecture.  The  removal  of  the  city  walls  in 
order  to  create  Parisian  boulevards,  the  rapid  projec- 
tion of  a  new  system  of  main  streets  throughout  the 

, .  .    .       ,  , ,       ,  „  The  specula- 

entire  municipal  area,  the  laying  out  of  new  quarters,    tive  period. 

and  the  speculative  construction  of  many  new  houses, 
with  a  growth  of  population  from  about  100,000  in  1861 
to  167,000  in  1871, —  all  this  meant  a  sudden  transfor- 
mation that  was  exceedingly  painful  to  foreign  ar- 
tists, poets,  and  students  of  the  medieval  Florence. 
The  removal  of  the  capital  to  Rome  caused  a  reaction 
in  Florence  that  bankrupted  many  individuals,  and 
almost  ruined  the  municipal  finances.  The  popula- 
tion  declined  sharply  with  the  removal  of  the  govern- 
mental bureaus,  and  even  in  1881  it  was  only  135,000 
—  20  per  cent,  less  than  in  1871.  But  time  and  the 


270  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  inevitable  progress  of  cities  have  more  than  restored 
the  loss,  and  at  the  end  of  1893  the  population  ex- 
ceeded 200,000.  Moreover,  the  later  improvements 
More  recent  have  been  executed  with  better  taste  and  judgment  in 
works0.  matters  of  detail  than  those  initiated  in  1865  and  the 
years  immediately  following ;  and  it  is  now  confessed 
that  Florence  has  not  been  altogether  "  vandalized  " 
by  the  progressive  Italians  of  the  new  regime.  The 
medieval  monuments  of  architecture  and  the  priceless 
art  collections  are  hardly  less  interesting  in  their 
modern  setting;  and  to  those  who  can  understand 
that  the  history  of  our  own  time  possesses  no  less 
dignity  and  value  than  the  history  of  other  centuries, 
it  gives  no  shock  to  find  a  modern  municipal  govern- 

Municipal  .  •  i  •    i     j.i_ 

offices  in  the  ment  occupying  the  Palazzo  Vecchio,  in  which  the 
signers  of  the  Florentine  Republic  once  had  their  seat 
of  government,  and  which  has  witnessed  six  eventful 
centuries.  Just  six  hundred  years  ago  Florence  was 
undergoing  a  more  relentless  reconstruction  than  that 
Florence  six  of  Our  own  generation.  It  was  then  that  the  present 
years  ago.  town-hall  was  built,  the  old  walls  were  demolished, 
suburbs  were  annexed,  and  the  new  walls  were  erected 
which  have  in  our  own  day  given  place  to  the  Viale  or 
boulevards.  The  fascinating  thing  in  Italy  is  the  con- 
tinuity of  life,  and  the  determination  to  keep  building 
new  history  upon  the  foundations  of  the  old.  The 
ancient  Romans  were  mighty  road-makers,  aqueduct- 
spirit  of  the  builders,  and  civil  engineers;  and  the  beautiful  ave- 
Bomans.  nues  of  Florence,  with  the  extensive  tram-lines  tra- 
versing the  town  and  its  adjacent  regions,  would  have 
their  heartiest  approval  if  appeal  could  be  made  to 
them;  while  the  electric  road  up  the  heights  to  an- 
tique Fiesole,  or  the  steam  tram-line  on  the  splendid 
new  Viale  dei  Colli  (a  winding  boulevard  on  the  slopes 
of  the  suburban  hills)  would  seem  to  them  the  very 
consummation  of  things  most  to  be  desired.  They 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


271 


could  not  possibly  comprehend  the  "  Ruskinian  affec- 
tation" (to  quote  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison)  of  sentimen- 
tal and  obscurantist  visitors  to  Italy,  who  "  shudder 
at  a  railroad,"  and  "  whine  over  the  conditions  of 
modern  progress."  It  does  not  follow  that  all  attempts 
at  modernization  are  either  necessary  or  wisely  con- 
ceived, and  doubtless  mistakes  have  been  made  at  Flor- 
ence. But  the  painful  sharpness  of  contrast  is  disap- 
pearing, and  the  new  begins  to  harmonize  with  the 
old  under  the  softening  hand  of  time,  aided  by  the 
more  refined  taste  that  now  prevails. 

But  transformations  elsewhere  in  Italy  were  wholly 
eclipsed  by  those  inaugurated  at  Rome  when  the. 
Quirinal  became  the  seat  of  the  national  government, 
the  sovereignty  of  the  papal  states  having  at  last  been 
merged  with  that  of  the  now  completed  kingdom. 
Such  an  abrupt  change  from  medieval  to  modern 
conditions  has  not  been  witnessed  elsewhere.  It  was 
as  if  all  the  European  changes  since  1789  had  been 
successfully  repelled  from  invading  the  domains  of 
the  Church,  and  had  then  suddenly  burst  across  the 
boundaries  in  one  resistless  flood.  "  There  was," 
exclaimed  Herman  Grimm,  "  an  infinite  calm,  a  love- 
liness and  stillness  in  which  the  poet  and  the  scholar 
could  draw  near  to  the  mighty  dead  who  had  once 
been  there  as  living  men.  There  was  nothing  like  it 
on  earth.  Now  it  is  destroyed  forever.  In  the  stead  of 
this  there  are  the  stench  of  engines,  the  dust  of  shat- 
tered bricks,  the  scream  of  steam  whistles,  the  mounds 
of  rubbish,  the  poles  of  scaffolding,  long  lines  of  houses 
raised  in  frantic  haste  on  malarious  soil,  enormous  bar- 
racks representative  of  the  martial  law  required  to  hold 
in  check  a  liberated  people ;  all  is  dirt,  noise,  confusion, 
hideousness,  crowding,  clamor,  avarice."  Mr.  Frederic 
Harrison,  who  admits  the  inevitability  of  the  changes 


CHAP.  IV. 


The  new 
Rome. 


A  startling 
transition. 


272  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.     and  endeavors  not  to  judge  them  harshly,  does  not 
try  to  conceal  his  sense  of  loss  in  the  disappearance 

by  an  Eng-    of  Rome's  "  medieval  halo."    And  he  reminds  us  of  the 

server.  "  fern-clad  ruins  standing  in  open  spaces,  gardens  or 
vineyards;  the  huge  solitudes  within  the  walls;  .  .  . 
the  narrow,  ill-lighted  streets;  the  swarm  of  monks, 
friars,  and  prelates  of  every  order  and  race;  the 
air  of  mouldering  abandonment  in  the  ancient  city, 
as  of  some  corner  of  medieval  Europe  left  forgotten 
and  untouched  by  modern  progress,  with  all  the  historic 
glamour,  the  pictorial  squalor,  the  Turkish  routine, 
all  the  magnificence  of  obsolete  forms  of  civilization 
which  clung  round  the  Vatican  and  were  seen  there 
only  in  western  Europe."  Such  was  the  Rome  of 
Mr.  Harrison's  first  visit ;  and  now  he  finds  that  the 
"  Rome,  which,  thirty  years  ago,  was  a  vision  of  the 
past,  is  to-day  a  busy  Italian  town,  with  a  dozen 
museums,  striving  to  become  a  third-rate  Paris." 
Mr.  Harrison  does  full  justice  to  the  archeological 
intelligence  and  solicitude  of  the  new  possessors  of 
Rome,  and  evidently  perceives  that  the  rapid  growth 
of  population  which  followed  the  establishment  of  the 
capital  there  must  in  any  case  have  compelled  in- 
numerable modern  changes.  Wherefore  he  does  not 
inveigh  against  tendencies  which  no  regrets  or  pro- 
tests could  have  checked  and  for  which  it  would  be 
useless  to  ascribe  blame. 

The  people  of  Rome  knew  practically  nothing  of 
communal  self-government  under  the  papal  regime. 
Prior  to  1847  there  sat  a  sort  of  municipal  council  on 

was  gov-     the  Capitoline,  but  it  was  not  a  representative  body  and 

erned  before    .,,,  „,,  ,    ,.      .,     -,     -,  ...  ml 

1870.  it  had  powers  of  the  most  limited  description.  The 
meagernessof  its  functions  is  best  illustrated  by  the  size 
of  its  budget.  It  was  allowed  by  the  authorities  of  the 
Papal  State  an  income  of  35,000  scudi  (188,125  lire,  less 
than  thirty-eight  thousand  dollars)  —  a  sum  hardly 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  273 

equal  to  the  expenditure  of  an  enterprising  village.  It  CHAP.  iv. 
is  to  the  credit  of  Pope  Pius  IX.  that  one  of  his  first 
pontifical  acts  was  the  granting  of  a  municipal  consti- 
tution to  Rome.  This  was  in  1847.  The  new  charter 
had  many  features  of  a  comparatively  liberal  char- 
acter. But  in  the  following  year  a  great  wave  of  revo- 
lution against  arbitrary  government  swept  across  Eu- 
rope, and  the  Pope  was  driven  from  Rome  only  to  be 
reinstated  a  year  or  two  later  by  French  arms.  At  the 
beginning  of  1851  the  papal  government  promulgated 
a  law  depriving  the  municipal  authorities  of  most  of 
their  independent  powers  and  again  reducing  the  mu- 
nicipality to  a  mere  shadow.  From  1851  to  1870  the  Municipal 
communal  budget  ranged  from  about  2,000,000  to  expenditure. 
about  3,500,000  lire  annually  (from  $400,000  to  $700,- 
000.  Among  the  principal  sources  of  income  were  the 
regular  appropriations  from  the  papal  government  of 
about  $200,000  a  year ;  the  taxes  superimposed  upon 
the  government's  levies  on  houses  and  lands  and  on 
wine  and  spirits,  and  the  tax  upon  horses  and  do- 
mestic animals.  The  six  principal  items  of  expendi- 
ture were  for  streets  and  ordinary  public  works, 
administration,  lighting,  cleansing,  cemeteries,  and 
festivals. 

In  view  of  the  completeness  of  the  papal  authority 
and  of  the  immense  wealth  of  the  Church,  the  physi-  The  church's 
cal  condition  of  the  holy  city  was  far  from  creditable     nRome.° 
to  the  government.     In  1870,  when  the  papal  pro- 
vinces became  a  part  of  the  new  kingdom  of  Italy, 
and  Rome  was  made  the  royal  capital,  its  people  were 
granted  the  municipal  liberties  that  the  other  cities    Municipal 

*•  home-rule 

of  Italy  enjoyed,  and  the  new  era  of  municipal  im-      in  isro. 
provement    was    entered    upon    immediately.     How 
promptly  the  public  services  were  extended  to  meet 
the  needs  of  a  great  community  can  best  be  expressed 
in  the  condensed  terms  of  budgetary  statistics.    The 

18 


274  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUKOPE 

CHAP.  iv.     municipal  income,  which  had  been  only  3,500,000  lire 

in  1870,  and  which  for  twenty  years  had  averaged 

Budgetary    only  about   2,700,000    lire,   exceeded    19,000,000    in 

expansion.    187^  and  reached  28,000,000  in  1885.     The  average 

municipal  income  and  expenditure  for  the  twenty 
years  following  the  new  order  of  things  instituted  in 
1870,  was  nearly  ten  times  as  great  as  the  average 
for  the  twenty  years  immediately  preceding. 

The  comparison  admirably  illustrates  the  enlarge- 
ment of  public  functions  in  recent  times.  In  most 
cities  the  expansion  had  been  gradual  and  the  con- 
trast was  less  sharp.  But  Rome  seemed  in  a  year  to 
have  made  up  for  a  century  of  lost  time.  Until  1870 
the  public  services  were  costing  at  the  rate  of  about 
fourteen  lire  a  year  for  each  inhabitant.  In  1872 
the  expenditure  per  capita  was  ninety  lire.  Growth  of 
population  has  since  diminished  the  per-capita  sum ; 
but  the  annual  average  is  seventy-five  or  eighty  lire. 

Newpublic  ,     .       =  *vi.«  •          M 

outlays.  Under  the  old  regime  the  street-lighting  was  insum- 
cient  j  it  was  immediately  so  extended  as  to  cost  three 
and  a  half  times  as  much  as  before.  Street-scaven- 
ging in  like  manner  was  made  vastly  more  effi- 
cient. The  sanitary  service  prior  to  1870  had  cost 
about  75,000  lire  a  year.  After  1871  it  amounted  to 
1,400,000  a  year,  an  increase  of  nearly  twentyfold. 
The  outlay  for  public  works,  including  streets,  sewers, 
accommodation  for  the  various  public  services  and  the 
other  usual  items,  also  illustrates  the  radical  change 
to  which  I  have  referred.  Under  the  new  regime  this 
outlay  at  once  expanded  several-fold.  In  the  old 
days  there  were  no  communal  schools,  while  now 
the  maintenance  of  elementary  instruction  under  the 
compulsory  school  law  entails  a  very  considerable 
expense.  The  fire  department  has  been  reorganized, 
modernized,  and  enlarged. 

Previous  to  1871  the  city  was  not  supplied  with  a 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  275 

system  of  sewers.    The  new  authorities  adopted  a    CHAP.  iv. 
scientific  plan  for  the  complete  drainage  of  the  city, 
using  the  Cloaca  Maxima  and  other  gigantic  sewers     dramage. 
of  ancient  Rome  for  the  main  tunnels.    The  system 
has  been  steadily  worked  out,  with  immense  advan- 
tage to  the  health  and  convenience  of  the  people. 
The  water-supply  of  Rome  had  been  famous  in  the 
ancient  times,  numerous  high  sources  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  city  having  always  been  ready  to  yield  an      Rome's 
abundant  quantity;  and  from  time  to  time  the  an-    Wap1ry^up 
cient  Romans  constructed  new  aqueducts  to  meet  the 
needs  of  the  growing  metropolis.    During  the  later 
period  of  the  Roman  empire,  the  city  was  magnifi- 
cently furnished  with  pure  water.     But  in  the  dark 
period  that  followed  the  triumph  of  the  barbarian  in- 
vaders, both  the  water-supply  and  the  drain age-sys-  ^ten?!^8" 
tern  became  deranged.     The  sewers  were  choked  up,      rariged- 
and  the  aqueducts  were  broken   down.    The  time 
came  when  the  Roman  population  was  obliged  to  re- 
sort to  the  Tiber,  and  to  dig  wells,  for  its  water-sup- 
ply.   The  Tiber  water  is  unfit  for  domestic  uses;      a^elthe 
and,  as  might  easily  be  believed  of  so  ancient  a  city,       Tiber- 
the  subsoil  is  saturated  with  poisonous  impurities  that 
render   well-water   dangerously   unwholesome.     The 
later  popes  accomplished   some  good  work  in  the 
restoration   of  aqueducts;    but   until   the  new  and 
secular  order  of  things  was  fairly  inaugurated,  the 
water-system  remained  lamentably  bad.     This  was 
the  more  inexcusable  because  the  situation  made  a 
good  supply  and  thorough  distribution  so  very  feasi- 
ble.   It  was  not  until  1885, — as  the  result  of  alarming 
disclosures  by  the  chemists  and  bacteriologists  of  a 
special  commission  on  the  hygiene  of  the  municipal-  w<j 
ity  of  Rome, —  that  all  the  wells  were  peremptorily 
closed.    The  municipal  authorities  have  repaired  the 
splendid  old  aqueducts,  improved  the  reservoirs,  and 


276 


CHAP.  IV. 

The  new 
aqueduct 
supply. 


Public 
fountains. 


Organization 
of  sanitary 
services. 


Declining 
rate  of  mor- 
tality. 


brought  the  daily  supply  up  to  a  total  of  60,000,000 
gallons,  or  more, — about  150  gallons  a  day  for  each 
inhabitant.  To  take  the  place  of  the  closed  wells 
the  municipal  authorities  have  added  greatly  to  the 
number  of  public  fountains.  At  the  beginning  of 
1886  there  were  in  the  city  162  ancient  fountains  of 
public  supply,  and  167  more  that  had  been  opened 
since  1870,  not  counting  25  or  30  fountains  of  a 
monumental  or  artistic  character.  The  number  has 
been  somewhat  increased  since  1886,  and  this  record 
is  among  the  most  creditable  of  the  many  reforms  of 
the  new  municipality. 

A  most  gratifying  reduction  of  the  death-rate,  es- 
pecially as  regards  those  classes  of  diseases  that  are 
amenable  to  sanitary  science,  has  followed  the  im- 
provements of  drainage,  of  water-supply,  of  cleans- 
ing, and  of  general  health  administration.  One  of 
the  first  acts  of  the  new  government  in  1870  was  the 
establishment  of  an  office  of  Igiene  ed  assistenza  sani- 
taria ;  and  the  functions  and  usefulness  of  this  de- 
partment have  been  steadily  augmented  from  year  to 
year.  This  work  is  carefully  systematized,  and  includes 
a  service  of  food  inspection,  one  of  house-to-house 
inspection  for  nuisances,  a  vaccination  service,  a  new 
hospital  system  for  the  isolation  of  epidemic  diseases 
with  the  chief  establishment  in  a  secluded  area  on 
the  Aventine  Hill,  a  system  of  sanitary  regulation  for 
cemeteries  and  funerals,  a  house  service  of  medical 
and  health  assistance  for  the  poor,  a  service  of  public 
dormitories,  an  exceedingly  interesting  and  useful  se- 
ries of  stations  for  night  medical  relief,  and  still  other 
distinct  features.  The  death-rate  of  Rome  in  1876 
was  within  a  fraction  of  30  per  1000.  It  was  lower 
in  1877,  but  the  average  for  1878,  1879,  and  1880  was 
just  under  28.  In  1885  it  was  26 ;  in  1893,  22.3,  and 
in  1894  only  19.4. 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


277 


The  systematic  reform  of  the  street-system  of  Rome 
did  not  begin  at  once  with  the  change  of  administra- 
tion. It  seemed  to  be  forced  upon  the  municipality 
by  the  development  of  population  and  the  necessity 
for  accommodating  a  traffic  which  had  enormously 
increased.  The  railroad  system  of  Italy  had  been  ex- 
tended, and  Rome  had  become  one  of  its  centers.  In 
1860  the  population  was  only  184,000.  In  1870  it  was 
226,000,  and  in  1880  it  had  increased  to  more  than 
300,000;  and  the  temporary  sojourners  and  visitors 
who  thronged  the  streets  were  a  vastly  multiplied 
host.  Moreover,  there  was  prospect  of  a  continued 
rapid  growth.  Half  a  million  people  before  the  end 
of  the  century  appeared  a  reasonable  estimate ;  and 
how  could  such  a  community,  busy  and  eager,  rest 
content  in  the  absence  of  main  street  arteries  and  of 
the  facilities  for  transit  and  traffic  that  have  become 
universal  in  this  age  ?  Certainly  the  outlook  of  the 
municipal  authorities  of  1880  has  been  justified  by  the 
subsequent  facts.  The  population  at  the  opening  of 
1894  exceeded  451,000,  and  the  gains  had  been  at  a 
rate  which  made  it  reasonable  to  expect  that  the  fig- 
ures would  reach  500,000  in  1900.  What  the  Roman 
people  could  have  done  under  these  conditions  of 
growth  and  commercial  progress  without  a  reformed 
street-system,  I  have  never  heard  any  of  the  critics 
attempt  to  explain. 

Some  preliminary  and  detached  improvements  had 
been  made  earlier,  but  it  was  not  until  1883  that  the 
so-called  piano  regolatore — the  complete  scheme  for  the 
straightening  and  enlarging  of  the  chief  thoroughfare 
system, —  was  finally  adopted  and  set  in  motion.  It 
had  for  its  examples  the  notable  improvements  of  re- 
cent years  in  the  street-systems  of  a  score  of  impor- 
tant European  cities  from  England  to  Hungary.  It 
has  seemed  to  me  that  the  Roman  project  was  a  rea- 

18* 


CHAP.  IV. 


Need  of 
street  re- 
forms. 


Continued 
population- 
growth. 


The  plans 
of  1883. 


278  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  sonable  and  conservative  one ;  that  is  to  say,  as  little 
arbitrary  and  destructive  as  circumstances  could  well 
allow,  and  notably  different  in  its  spirit  and  methods 
from  the  iconoclastic  and  uncompromising  nature  of 
the  earlier  Parisian  projects.  Inasmuch  as  nearly  every 
street  in  Rome  —  except  in  the  new  suburbs  —  was 
narrow  and  irregular,  leading  nowhere  in  particular, 
the  reformers  determined  that  some  main  arteries 
were  indispensable,  and  proceeded  to  create  them.  It 
was  resolved  to  contract  a  municipal  loan  of  150,000,- 
Puwic-  00°  lire  ($30>00°,000)  for  tne  accomplishment  of  the 
works  loan,  work,  the  Italian  government  lending  its  aid  by  a 
guaranty  of  the  debt.  One  of  the  first  great  works 
undertaken  was  the  creation  of  the  new  Via  Nazionale 
in  extension  eastward  of  the  Corso  Vittorio  Eman- 
uele,  at  a  cost  of  more  than  twelve  million  lire.  At 
the  western  end  of  this  broad  Corso,  which  until  1890 
led  nowhither,  heavy  demolitions  were  made  to  cut 
some  of  the  the  thoroughfare  through  to  the  new  Tiber  bridge 
neAments!ve  Vittorio  Emanuele,  and  further  demolitions  on  the 
west  side  of  the  Tiber  were  to  continue  the  avenue  as 
a  broad  and  unobstructed  approach  to  the  Piazza  of 
St.  Peter's.  Another  of  the  new  streets  is  the  Via  Ca- 
vour,  leading  eastward  from  the  Forum  to  the  main 
railway  station.  At  the  foot  of  the  Corso,  and  ex- 
tending to  the  east  side  of  the  Forum,  very  important 
demolitions  were  required  by  the  plan.  The  magnifi- 
cent new  retaining  walls  of  the  Tiber  and  the  new 
bridges  Garibaldi  and  Umberto  were  built  as  a  part 
of  this  huge  improvement  scheme;  and  broad  thor- 
oughfares were  projected,  with  much  demolition  of 
old  structures,  as  approaches  to  these  bridges.  These 
details  are  sufficient  perhaps  to  indicate  the  character 
of  a  project  which  required  more  than  one  decade  for 
its  entire  completion,  but  which  has  already  effected 
most  noteworthy  transformations. 


RECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  279 

But  still  more  recent  than  the  "piano  regolatore"  are  CHAP.  iv. 
other  glittering  projects  evolved  by  the  enterprising 
municipal  government  of  Rome,  with  the  cooperation 
of  an  ambitious  national  government  that  desires  to 
make  its  capital  one  of  the  finest  and  most  attractive 
of  modern  cities.  One  of  these  projects  is  the  estab-  Anarch«o- 
lishment  of  the  lines  of  a  Passeggiata  Arckeologica.  °gvation?er 
Within  the  area  thus  delimited  it  was  determined  that 
there  should  be  no  further  erection  of  private  build- 
ings, and  it  was  the  purpose  of  the  government  to 
exappropriate  and  acquire  the  entire  tract,  and  con- 
vert it  into  a  public  park,  whose  chief  attractions 
would  be  the  ruined  monuments  of  old  Rome.  The 
passeggiata  contains  within  its  precincts  the  Forum, 
the  Coliseum,  the  Forum  of  Trajan,  the  baths  of 
Titus,  the  remains  of  the  palaces  of  the  Caesars  on  the 
Palatine,  the  Circus  Maximus,  the  baths  of  Caracalla, 
the  temples  of  Vesta  and  Fortuna,  and  other  ancient 
remains,  and  includes  an  extensive  area  of  land  made 
up  of  parts  of  the  Capitoline,  Aventine,  Palatine,  and 
Ccelian  hills, —  an  area  densely  populated  in  ancient 
times,  but  now  almost  bare,  and  lying  to  the  south  of 
the  heart  of  the  modern  city.  Not  only  would  this 
reserved  area  make  a  noble  park,  but  it  would  also, 
when  cleared  according  to  the  proposed  plans,  render 
the  archeological  remains  by  far  more  intelligible  in 
their  relative  positions  than  they  have  been  hitherto. 
Moreover,  new  and  instructive  discoveries  are  con- 
stantly being  made  by  excavations. 

A  much  larger  project,  so  far  as  cost  and  superficies 
are  concerned,  is  that  of  a  grand  park  and  boulevard- 
system  in  the  district  now  occupied  by  scattered  villas 
and  gardens  north  of  the  Porta  Pinciana  and  within 
the  bend  of  the  Tiber.  This  is  planned  upon  a  mag- 
nificent scale,  and  its  realization  will  cost  an  enor-  Pp7rpk°.se 
mous  sum.  Inasmuch  as  the  project  itself  is  defi- 


280  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  iv.  nitely  conceived,  and  is  agreed  upon  by  the  govern- 
ments of  the  State  and  the  municipality,  it  might  be 
carried  into  effect  gradually  and  the  expenditure  dis- 
tributed through  a  long  series  of  years.  But  financial 
difficulties  are  compelling  the  postponement  of  active 
work  on  such  projects,  perhaps  until  the  opening  of 
the  new  century.  I  have  instanced  enough  to  show 
that  the  rehabilitation  of  Rome  as  begun  and  as 
planned  will  entitle  it  in  due  time  to  rank  among  the 
most  progressive  of  modern  cities. 

While  these  improvements  have  been  made  under 
public  auspices,  Rome  has  been  the  scene  of  a  remark- 
able amount  of  building  by  private  owners.  Along 
the  revised  or  newly  created  business  thoroughfares 
are  to  be  found  long  lines  of  new  commercial  edifices 5 
Activity  in  but  it  is  in  the  erection  of  large  and  high  residence 

building,  blocks  that  the  building  activity  has  been  greatest. 
Lying  adjacent  to  the  older  city  on  every  side  are 
new  quarters  platted  in  regular  squares,  and  largely 
built  upon  with  plain  but  superior  and  massive  apart- 
ment-houses. The  greater  part  of  this  new  construc- 
tion has  been  made  since  1880,  and  much  is  now  in 
progress.  Thus  a  large  addition  has,  within  a  few 
years,  been  built  up  in  very  regular  blocks  just  north 
of  the  castle  San  Angelo ;  and  as  one  looks  out  over 
it  from  the  eastern  balconies  of  the  Vatican,  the  effect 
of  Chicago-like  newness  is  very  strange.  The  most 
extensive  of  these  new  quarters  are,  however,  at  the 
opposite  side  of  the  city,  in  the  east  and  northeast. 
For  its  own  official  uses  the  government  caused  to  be 
prepared,  several  years  ago,  an  elaborate  map  show- 
ing by  different  colors  the  demolitions  required  under 

Amapofthe         to      '  JUT 

new  Rome,  the  street-regulation  plan,  the  proposed  boulevard 
system  in  the  north,  with  the  projected  new  Mar- 
gherita  Park,  the  perimeter  of  the  passeggiata  archeo- 
logica  in  the  south,  the  tracts  of  ground  occupied  or 


RECENT  PEOGEESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES 


281 


reserved  by  the  government  as  sites  of  actual  or  pro- 
posed public  buildings,  the  built-up  area  as  it  existed 
in  1870,  the  new  house-building  accomplished  in  the 
decade  1870-80,  that  from  1880  to  1888,  and  that  in 
process  or  anticipation  in  1889.  The  rapid  creation 
of  a  new  Rome,  as  thus  shown  graphically,  is  most 
impressive. 

It  is  a  satisfaction  to  observe  that  the  new  tenement- 
houses  of  Rome  are  a  vast  improvement  over  the  old 
ones  in  structural  and  sanitary  respects.  While  the 
housing  of  the  population  of  large  cities  is  admittedly 
the  most  serious  social  question  of  the  day,  and  while 
only  a  few  cities  have  ventured  upon  the  policy  of 
extensive  exappropriation,  demolition,  and  rebuilding 
for  the  sole  or  chief  purpose  of  improving  the  dwell- 
ings of  the  poor,  it  is  fortunate  that  many  cities  have 
been  awakened  to  the  important  fact  that  much  future 
evil  can  be  averted  by  strict  regulations  as  regards 
the  character  and  arrangements  of  new  houses.  The 
building  rules  of  a  city  have  a  public  and  social  im- 
portance that  is  now,  tardily,  becoming  recognized. 
Of  Rome  it  can  certainly  be  said  that  the  average 
character  of  the  house  accommodation  of  families  has 
improved  materially,  although,  as  yet,  the  housing  of 
the  very  poorest  classes  is  probably  little  better  than 
twenty  years  ago.  The  present  building  regulations 
of  Rome,  adopted  after  very  careful  consideration  in 
1887,  are  among  the  most  approved  and  advanced  in 
the  world.  They  bring  under  strict  public  surveil- 
lance everything  that  has  to  do  with  the  style,  mate- 
rials, construction,  size,  and  sanitary  arrangements 
of  buildings.  For  example,  they  establish  the  rule 
that  the  height  of  buildings  must  not  exceed  once 
and  a  half  the  width  of  the  street  upon  which  they 
front,  with  the  proviso,  however,  of  a  minimum  height 
of  fourteen  meters  and  a  maximum  of  twenty-four. 


CHAP.  IV. 


Regulation 
of  building. 


The  new 
rules  at 
Rome. 


Provisions 

for  light  and 

air. 


282 
CHAP.  IV. 


Other 
restrictions. 


Historic 

edifices 

protected. 


The  awaken- 
ing of 
Naples. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE  • 

They  require  that  buildings  shall  be  provided  with 
inner  courts,  the  narrowest  side  of  which  shall  not 
measure  less  than  one  third  the  height  of  the  build- 
ing; and  they  do  not  permit  a  narrower  space  between 
houses  than  the  width  prescribed  for  courts. 

Those  who  have  examined  the  buildings  of  the  old, 
crowded  parts  of  European  cities,  where  there  is  the 
least  possible  free  space  left  unbuilt  upon,  and  there- 
fore the  most  inadequate  provision  for  air  and  light, 
can  best  appreciate  the  importance  of  a  regulation 
requiring  a  reasonable  area  of  open  courts.  The 
Roman  regulations  further  establish  the  minimum 
height  of  ceilings,  require  that  every  apartment  or 
group  of  apartments  designed  for  a  family  shall  have 
water-supply  and  sewer  connections,  and  enter  into 
great  detail  as  regards  all  matters  of  appearance  and 
health.  Gradually,  through  the  operation  of  these 
enlightened  rules  for  new  building,  and  through  de- 
molitions from  time  to  time  of  ancient  tenements,  the 
housing  of  the  Roman  population  will  become  en- 
tirely transformed.  One  section  of  the  new  building 
code  of  1887  authorized  the  Commissione  Edillzia  to 
make  out  a  list  of  all  structures  of  an  historical  and 
artistic  character,  and  forbade  their  destruction  or 
alteration,  even  by  their  private  owners,  without  pub- 
lic authority.  Thus,  while  Rome  is  rebuilding,  there 
is  nothing  of  real  interest  or  worth  that  is  allowed  to 
perish. 

Rome's  municipal  undertakings  were,  however,  des- 
tined in  turn  to  be  surpassed  by  those  of  another  Italian 
city.  Naples  awoke  in  its  turn,  and  entered  in  a  sys- 
tematic manner  upon  what  is  perhaps  the  largest 
definite  program  of  sanitary  renovation  ever  un- 
dertaken by  any  city, —  a  scheme  whose  full  accom- 
plishment can  cost  hardly  less  than  500,000,000  lire 


283 

($100,000,000).    The  project  owes  its  inception  to  the    CHAP.  iv. 

cholera  epidemic  of  1884, —  or,  rather,  the  epidemic 

was  the  occasion,  while  the  new  energy  and  courage 

of  United  Italy  gave  origin  to  the  plan  of  action. 

The  whole  country  was  aroused  in  behalf  of  Naples, 

and  the  parliament  in  1885  voted  an  appropriation  of 

100,000,000  lire  toward  the  cost  of  a  complete  new    program  of 

,  „  renovation. 

sewer-system,  a  new  water-system,  a  scheme  of  sweep- 
ing demolitions  and  street  alterations  in  the  low  and 
crowded  quarters  of  the  city,  and  a  corresponding 
plan  for  the  construction  of  new  quarters  on  the 
higher  ground  at  the  eastern  limits,  and  ultimately  on 
the  northern  and  western  slopes.  Naturally,  much 
delay  was  experienced  in  the  arrangement  of  prelimi- 
naries, in  negotiations  with  private  owners,  and  in  the 
development  of  the  plan  in  detail.  The  new  water.  The  new 
supply  was  introduced  immediately,  from  high  moun-  w^ettreS!d 
tain  sources  near  Avellino,  fifty  or  sixty  miles  dis- 
tant. The  sewer-system  was  taken  in  hand  also  and 
prosecuted  with  energy. 

But  the  piano  di  risanamenlo  —  the  project  of  re- 
habilitating the  old  quarters  —  was  found  as  delicate 
in  detail  as  it  was  huge  in  its  entirety.  It  was  not  Tbe  "rfsana- 

*  inento      be- 

until  the  summer  of  1889  that  the  actual  work  was  gun  ™  isss. 
begun,  in  the  presence  of  the  king  and  queen,  who  had 
taken  a  deep  interest  in  it  from  the  beginning.    A 
few  statistics  may  be  of  assistance  in  explaining  the 
scope  of  this  undertaking,  as  furnished  by  the  com- 
munal assessor,  Professor  Alberto  Marghieri.    The 
number  of  proprietors  whose  property  was  to  be 
taken  in  whole  or  in  part  was  7100, —  5400  of  these 
exappropriations  being  entire.     The  awards  for  such 
property  were  estimated  at  not  less  than  93,000,000  statistics  of 
lire.     The  amount  of  ground  to  be  cleared  and  re-  detuned  area. 
built,  or  to  be  redeemed  and  raised  to  a  higher  grade, 
was  about  1,000,000   square  meters.    The   area    of 


284 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IV. 


Proposed 
transfer  of 
population. 


Motives  of 
the  project. 


An  end  of 
epidemics. 


Antiquity  of 

the  Naples 

slums. 


improvement  included  271  old  streets,  of  which  144 
were  to  be  abolished  entirely,  and  127  retained  and 
widened.  The  number  of  people  to  be  unhoused  was 
about  90,000.  Of  habitations  destined  to  be  destroyed 
there  were  17,000.  Churches  to  the  number  of  62 
were  doomed,  as  were  a  large  number  of  shops  and 
other  establishments.  Streets  and  open  squares  rep- 
resented 22  per  cent,  of  the  area  to  be  renewed.  Un- 
der the  new  scheme  they  would  occupy  62  per  cent,  of 
the  area.  The  population  of  the  area  had  a  density 
in  1889  of  1610  per  hectare  (2J  acres).  This  would 
be  reduced  to  700  per  hectare, —  and  perhaps  to  still 
less ;  for  the  new  quarters  (piano  di  ampliamento)  in 
the  suburbs  were  eventually  to  provide  house-room  for 
180,000  persons. 

The  carrying  out  of  this  vast  reform  was  to  be  ac- 
companied by  the  enforcement  of  improved  sanitary 
laws,  and  by  various  minor  municipal  improvements. 
It  was  also  believed  that  a  great  industrial  impetus 
would  be  given  to  Naples,  and  that  as  a  result  of  the 
general  stir  and  agitation  the  thousands  of  occupa- 
tionless  plebeians  might  be  evolved  into  a  regular 
working  class.  Costly  as  the  great  experiment  must 
be,  its  courageous  advocates  had  no  doubt  that  it 
would  be  profitable.  They  believed  that  the  expendi- 
ture would  not  represent  wealth  sunk  and  lost,  but 
on  the  contrary,  that  it  would  be  a  most  advantageous 
investment  for  Naples  and  for  Italy.  It  promises  in 
any  event  practically  to  end  Italian  epidemics;  and 
that  result  alone  would  justify  a  far  greater  invest- 
ment, even  from  the  purely  commercial  point  of  view. 
It  is  pleasant  to  believe  that  the  new  Naples  is  to  be 
worthy  of  its  beautiful  situation  and  its  unsurpassed 
environment.  The  quarters  undergoing  renovation 
are  very  old,  dating  back  in  part  to  the  Greco-Roman 
period,  and  in  part  to  the  early  middle  ages ;  but  there 


EECENT  PEOGEESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  285 

was  comparatively  little  of  priceless  value  in  their  an-  CHAP.  iv. 
tiquity.  The  existence  of  these  overcrowded  and  un- 
wholesome slums  is  much  less  disgraceful,  when  the 
facts  are  considered  impartially,  than  is  the  recent 
development  of  crowded  and  unwholesome  slums  in 
American  cities,  where  the  neglect  of  simple  and  ob- 
vious preventive  measures  has  made  it  certain  that 
drastic  and  costly  remedies  must  be  employed  in  a 
future  not  far  distant. 

The  Naples  projects  have  made  very  large  advances 
toward  completion,  although  the  execution  of  the  full 
plans  will  yet  require  a  number  of  years.  About  50,- 

Actual 

000,000  lire  had  been  paid  to  dispossessed  owners  from  progress. 
1889  to  1894,  the  chief  new  thoroughfares  in  the  old 
quarters  had  been  constructed,  and  thousands  of  good 
houses  had  been  built  in  the  new  districts,  in  confor- 
mity with  the  requirements  of  a  strict  new  code  of 
building  regulations.  Many  thousands  of  people  had 
been  transferred  to  the  improved  dwellings,  and  street- 
railway  lines  had  been  placed  in  operation  on  the  re- 
formed avenues  and  extended  to  the  attractive  sub- 
urban additions.  The  actual  carrying  out  both  of  the 
"risanamento"  project  and  of  the  "ampliamento"  Execution  of 
schemes  were  intrusted  to  private  companies  with  a 
large  capital  which  act  as  agents  of  the  municipal  gov- 
ernment  under  carefully  devised  contracts.  Although 
large  sums  are  involved  in  the  necessary  operations,  it 
is  to  be  expected  that  the  resales  of  street  frontage  on 
important  new  business  streets,  and  good  financial 
management  in  the  new  residence  quarters,  will  ulti- 
mately reimburse  the  municipal  treasury  for  the 
greater  part  of  the  investment.  Meanwhile,  the  trans- 
formations already  accomplished  have  proved  them-  Effect  n 
selves  eminently  advantageous  to  the  city  in  all  the  mortality. 
phases  of  its  life.  A  usual  death-rate  for  Naples  until 
recently  was  33  or  more  per  1000.  It  is  not  time  yet 


286 
CHAP.  IV. 


As  to  the 
Neapolitan 
population. 


Growth  of 
Palermo. 


Earlier  im- 
provements. 


Present 
undertakings. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

to  expect  radical  results  from  sanitary  reforms  to  which 
the  domestic  life  of  the  people  has  become  adapted  only 
to  a  limited  extent.  But  the  rate  for  1894  was  reduced 
to  27.5 ;  and  it  is  likely  that  the  average  will  hence- 
forth be  lower  even  than  this  encouraging  figure. 

Naples  remains  the  most  populous  Italian  city,  al- 
though Rome  and  Milan  have  been  gaining  upon  it 
rapidly.  In  the  early  sixties  it  had  about  450,000 
people,  and  no  other  city  of  Italy  had  nearly  half  so 
many.  The  Neapolitans  of  thirty  years  ago  were  not 
an  effective  population,  but  included  great  swarms  of 
idlers  and  beggars.  There  were  in  1895  about  540,000 
people  in  Naples ;  and  the  changed  times,  with  new 
industrial  opportunities,  have  much  improved  the 
average  status  of  the  inhabitants,  and  diminished  the 
numbers  of  the  unoccupied  poor. 

Since  1880,  the  growth  of  Palermo,  Sicily's  capital, 
now  the  fifth  Italian  city  in  size,  has  been  very  note- 
worthy. It  had  in  that  year  hardly  more  than  200,000 
people,  while  at  the  opening  of  1894  it  had  276,000, 
with  the  prospect  of  reaching  the  300,000  mark  at  the 
end  of  the  decade.  The  municipality  of  Palermo  has 
exhibited  a  surprising  vigor  in  the  construction  of 
new  avenues,  and  in  the  general  amplification  and 
adornment  of  the  city.  The  two  broad,  straight 
avenues,  which  meet  at  right  angles  in  the  heart  of 
the  city  and  cut  Palermo  into  four  sections,  do  not 
belong  to  the  present  era  of  reconstruction,  but  were 
executed  by  the  Spanish  viceroys  of  Sicily,  who  made 
Palermo  their  seat  of  government  in  the  sixteenth 
and  seventeenth  centuries.  But  many  new  avenues 
attest  the  zeal  of  the  present 'municipal  authorities. 
The  spirit  of  modern  enterprise  has  taken  full  pos- 
session of  the  town.  New  water-works,  drainage- 
schemes,  and  other  sanitary  reforms ;  much  attention 


EECENT  PROGRESS  OF  ITALIAN  CITIES  287 

to  paving ;  rapid  progress  in  the  extension  of  street-     CHAP.  iv. 
railways ;  a  decided  taste  for  electrical  applications  — 
all  these  are  characteristics  of  a  town  that  dates  from 
Phenician  times,  but  feels  itself  as  young  and  modern 
as  an  Australian  capital. 

There  are  smaller  cities  in  Italy  which  have  caught 
the  infection  of  modern  progress;  but  of  Bologna 
and  Leghorn,  Catania,  and  the  rest,  it  is  needless  to 
discourse.  What  they  are  attempting  is  merely  to 
follow  the  example  of  their  more  important  contem- 
poraries. Venice  has  hitherto  escaped  any  very  shock- 
ing alterations.  Few  casual  visitors  would  be  likely 
to  have  discovered  how  much  attention  the  Venetian 
authorities  had  of  late  been  devoting  to  various  sani-  Engineering 

TT          •!       ii-  projects  at 

tary  engineering  projects.  Happily,  the  new  water-  Venice. 
supply  of  Venice,  the  new  sewer  projects,  the  plan  for 
a  great  hospital  for  infectious  diseases,  and  various 
other  proposed  reforms  could  not  affect  the  pictu- 
resqueness  of  the  place.  But  with  exceedingly  little 
new  construction  of  houses,  the  Venetian  population 
has  expanded  since  1866  by  more  than  30,000  people. 

'          r      r         Recent  over- 

And  this  increase  of  25  per  cent,  (from  about  120,000  crowding  of 

Venetian 

to  more  than  150,000)  has  resulted  in  a  very  serious    tenements. 
overcrowding  of  the  old  tenements,  in  consequence  of 
which  the  death-rate  has  materially  increased,  partic- 
ularly within  the  past  fifteen  or  twenty  years.    Obvi- 
ously, the  situation  of  Venice  does  not  permit  an  easy 
and  simple  overflow  into  attractive  suburbs.    To  re- 
lieve congestion  in  slums  of  a  growingly  bad  charac- 
ter, the  municipal  authorities,  with  the  revision  and  A  formidable 
approval  of  the  central  government,  have  drawn  up  a  construction. 
project  that  will  necessitate  a  large  amount  of  demo- 
lition and  rebuilding,  attended  with  street  rectifica- 
tions and  other  changes.    The  limited  ground  area 
makes  it  essential  to  plan  for  the  most  economical 
utilization  of  space  in  reconstruction. 


288 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IV. 


Venice  not 

to  be 

"  Hauss- 

mannized." 


But  modern- 
ized, never- 
theless. 


It  is  with  some  misgivings  that  I  have  endeavored 
to  acquaint  myself  with  the  nature  and  scope  of  these 
plans.  So  far  as  I  have  studied  them,  however,  I 
have  been  led  toward  the  welcome  impression  that 
their  carrying  out  will  not  very  materially  lessen  the 
charm  of  Venice,  and  that  the  parts  of  the  city  most 
frequented  by  visitors  will  remain  practically  undis- 
turbed. Into  the  details  of  the  pending  projects  it  is 
not  necessaiy  to  enter.  It  is  only  to  be  said  that  the 
adoption  at  Venice  of  a  piano  di  risanamento  e  piano 
regolatore, —  which  plans  concern  themselves  with  nu- 
ove  arterie  di  comunicazione, —  marks  the  final  victory 
of  the  modern  spirit  of  practical  progress  and  of  sani- 
tary reform  in  its  relentless  assaults  upon  the  famous 
old  cities  of  western  and  central  Europe. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  FRAMEWORK  OF  GERMAN  CITY 
GOVERNMENT 

" ~|%/rUNICIPAL  housekeeping," as  a  science  and  an 
.1.T-L  art,  evolved  out  of  the  conditions  of  life  pre- 
vailing in  the  last  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  can 
for  various  reasons  be  observed  to  better  advantage  in 
Germany  than  in  any  other  country.  It  is  true  that 
the  German  cities  had  been  somewhat  tardy  in  pro- 
viding themselves  with  modern  conveniences  and  im- 
provements. But  now,  having  fairly  entered  upon  the  Municipal 
task,  they  are  accomplishing  it  in  a  more  systematic,  Germany n 
thorough,  and  businesslike  way  than  any  other  cities, 
whether  in  Europe,  America,  or  Australia.  The  Ger- 
mans have  been  in  their  habits  of  life  a  rather  primi- 
tive, simple  people  —  less  fastidious  than  the  English, 
French,  or  Americans.  In  large  part  they  have  been 
a  rural  people ;  and  whether  in  town  or  in  country, 
the  average  family  income  has  been  very  small,  and 
the  ordinary  scale  of  living  extremely  modest.  The 
arrangements  of  the  towns  had  partaken  of  this  sim- 
ple, old-fashioned  regime  of  family  and  social  life,  and 
had  been  in  like  manner  primitive  and  unsuited  to 
the  demands  of  a  complex,  artificial  civilization,  and 
altogether  regardless  of  the  new  sciences  of  sanitation 
and  city-making. 

But  a  great  change  has  come  over  the  German  na- 
tion, and  nowhere  is  its  altered  character  shown  more 
distinctly  than  in  the  expansion  and  progress,  of  the 


19 


290 


MUNICIPAL  QOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 

A  pending 
transforma- 
tion. 


Standards 
of  living 
altered. 


Scientific 
methods. 


Effective  ad- 
ministrative 
methods. 


cities.  The  centers  of  population  are  growing  with 
extraordinary  rapidity  by  inflow  from  the  rural  dis- 
tricts. The  Germans  are  in  the  midst  of  a  quick 
transition  from  an  agricultural  into  a  manufacturing 
people.  The  old  seats  of  petty  princes  or  dukes  are 
coming  into  a  transformed  and  enlarged  existence  as 
industrial  towns.  Railways  and  traffic  have  lately 
become  factors  of  a  wholly  new  importance,  helping 
to  emphasize  the  distinction  between  town  and  country 
and  to  modernize  the  character  of  the  towns. 

Simultaneously  with  this  recent  growth  of  indus- 
tries and  town  population  in  Germany,  there  has  been 
—  arising  in  large  part  from  military  success  and 
enhanced  international  prestige  and  importance  —  a 
marked  advance  in  the  standards  of  living,  and  a  new 
demand  for  modern  and  luxurious  appointments.  An 
intense  quickening  of  national  pride  has  made  the 
people  and  the  governing  authorities  eager  to  adopt 
late  improvements,  and  ambitious  to  rival  France, 
England,  and  America  in  matters  that  Germany  had 
before  neglected. 

To  this  work  of  modern  improvement,  especially 
in  public  appointments,  the  Germans  seem  to  have 
brought  more  of  the  scientific  spirit  and  method  than 
any  other  people.  Their  habits  of  thoroughness  in 
research,  and  of  patient,  exhaustive  treatment  of  any 
subject  in  hand,  have  fully  characterized  their  new 
progress  in  the  arts  of  civilized  life. 

Above  all,  the  Germans  had  already  developed  a 
system  of  public  administration  more  economical  and 
more  infallibly  effective  than  could  have  been  found 
elsewhere ;  and  they  were  prepared,  when  the  growth 
of  their  cities  and  the  new  demand  for  modern  im- 
provements made  necessary  a  great  increase  in  the 
number  and  variety  of  public  functions,  to  do  in  the 
best  possible  way  whatever  it  was  decided  to  under- 


THE   GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


291 


take.  So  confident  were  they,  indeed,  in  the  efficiency 
of  their  administrative  organization,  that  they  dared 
to  assign  to  the  municipalities  spheres  of  action  which 
elsewhere  have  been  left  to  private  effort. 

The  Germans  have,  unquestionably,  a  higher  capa- 
city for  organized  social  action  than  Anglo-Saxon  or 
Celtic  peoples ;  and  the  socialism  of  the  State  or  mu- 
nicipality —  or  the  increase  of  "  collectivism,"  if  one 
likes  that  word  better  than  "  socialism,"  meaning 
thereby  the  multiplication  of  the  business  functions 
of  government  —  might  naturally  be  expected  to  have 
made  greater  progress  in  Germany  than  elsewhere. 
Moreover,  as  I  have  had  occasion  to  remark  in  writ- 
ing of  affairs  in  the  Danubian  valley,  when  a  nation's 
political  and  military  progress  has  very  much  out- 
stripped its  industrial  progress,  public  initiative  is 
relatively  stronger  than  private  initiative ;  and  it  is 
comparatively  easy  for  the  people  to  agree  to  act  to- 
gether through  their  governmental  agencies  in  estab- 
lishing this  or  that  enterprise  of  common  concern. 
In  central,  eastern,  and  southeastern  Europe  private 
capital  is  far  less  highly  developed  than  in  France, 
the  Netherlands,  England,  and  the  United  States; 
and  the  recent  demand  for  various  modern  facilities 
and  improvements  has  not  found  native  entrepre- 
neurs and  private  capitalists  prepared  to  meet  it  ade- 
quately. Circumstances  have  seemed  to  render  it 
practically  necessary  for  national  or  municipal  gov- 
ernments to  inaugurate  and  conduct  many  such  en- 
terprises. This  suggestion  has  very  pertinent  bearing 
upon  our  general  subject  of  German  municipal  eco- 
nomics ;  for,  unless  due  weight  were  given  to  such 
considerations,  we  should  be  in  danger  of  making  our 
estimates  and  comparisons  without  a  proper  allow- 
ance for  the  dissimilar  conditions  that  determine  the 
scope  of  public  functions  in  different  countries. 


CHAP.  V. 


"Municipal 
socialism." 


Why  public 
initiative  is 
natural  in 
Germany. 


292 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Berlin  as  a 

modernized 

city. 


Newness  of 

European 

towns. 


Comparative 
growth  of 

German  and 

American 

cities. 


In  the  rapidity  of  its  growth,  in  its  regularity,  and 
in  its  general  air  of  newness,  Berlin  suggests  Chicago. 
But  while  Chicago  in  its  buildings  and  appointments 
other  than  governmental  and  municipal  is  for  the 
most  part  superior  to  Berlin,  the  German  capital  is 
incomparably  superior  to  Chicago  in  its  municipal 
and  public  arrangements.  Chicago  and  our  other 
fast-growing  American  cities  find  great  difficulty  in 
extending  urban  facilities  to  keep  pace  in  any  decent 
fashion  with  the  growth  of  population  and  the  en- 
largement of  area ;  but  in  Berlin  the  authorities  have 
systematically  and  easily  provided  for  the  develop- 
ment of  a  city  that  is  several  times  as  large  as  it  was 
in  1860,  and  that  has  within  a  few  years  been  trans- 
forming all  its  services  and  appointments. 

We  Americans  have  such  a  surfeit  at  home  of  new 
towns  and  new  extensions  of  older  towns,  that  it  is 
not  surprising  that  we  should  be  looking  for  the  old 
rather  than  the  new  in  our  European  travels.  The 
guide-books  are  all  made  upon  the  supposition  that 
American  tourists  are  painfully  eager  to  see  every- 
thing of  antiquarian  or  historical  interest,  and  that 
they  care  nothing  whatever  for  Europe  as  the  present- 
day  home  of  progressive  peoples.  For  the  most  part, 
therefore,  we  fail  to  appreciate  the  full  force  and  sig- 
nificance of  the  immense  modern  impetus  that  is 
transforming  the  European  cities.  Most  of  them 
have  an  ancient  or  medieval  nucleus,  but  otherwise 
they  are  as  new  as  our  American  cities,  and  in  many 
respects  they  are  more  modern  and  enterprising. 

Indeed,  there  seems  to  be  an  almost  unconquerable 
delusion  in  the  popular  mind  that  our  American  cities 
are  the  only  ones  which  show  the  phenomenon  of 
rapid  growth,  and  that  their  newness  excuses  their 
failure  to  provide  well  for  the  common  necessities  of 
urban  life.  I  must  ask  leave  to  present  a  few  statis- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK 


293 


tics  to  meet  this  delusion.  In  1870  New  York  was  a 
considerably  more  populous  city  than  Berlin.  It  had 
nearly  950,000  people,  while  Berlin  had  barely  800,- 
000.  In  1880  Berlin  had  outgrown  New  York,  and  in 
1890  it  still  maintained  the  lead,  having  1,578,794 
people  as  against  New  York's  1,515,301.  Chicago's 
relative  gain  has  been  higher ;  but  Berlin  in  the  past 
twenty-five  years  has  added  as  many  actual  new  resi- 
dents as  has  Chicago.  Thirty  years  ago  Philadelphia 
was  a  larger  city  than  Berlin;  but  since  then  it  has 
added  only  half  a  million  souls  to  its  total  number, 
while  Berlin  has  added  a  million.  These  figures  are 
cited  in  order  to  give  a  comparative  impression  of  the 
problems  Berlin  has  had  to  meet  in  providing  for  the 
accommodation  of  its  expanding  municipal  household. 

Let  us  take  another  instance.  In  1875  Hamburg 
had  348,000  people,  and  Boston  had  342,000.  In  1890 
Hamburg  had  569,260,  and  Boston  had  448,000.  Ham- 
burg had  gained  more  than  200,000  in  fifteen  years, 
and  Boston  had  gained  only  a  little  more  than  100,000. 
Yet  Boston's  growth  has  been  accounted  remarkable. 
Baltimore  is  sometimes  likened  for  wealth  and  pros- 
perity to  Hamburg.  In  the  early  seventies  they  were 
of  equal  size.  But  Hamburg  has  grown  twice  as  fast. 
In  1880  the  German  port  had  410,127  dwellers,  and  in 
1890  they  were  569,260,  while  Baltimore's  census  for 
the  same  years  showed  332,313  and  434,439.  The  areas 
of  Boston,  Baltimore,  and  Hamburg  were  about  equal. 

The  third  German  city  in  size  is  Leipsic.  It  is  a 
manufacturing  town  which  had  127,000  people  in 
1875,  149,000  in  1880,  170,000  in  1885,  and  355,000  in 
1890.  The  annexation  of  suburbs  accounts  in  part 
for  the  immense  gain  of  the  half  decade  from  1885  to 
1890;  but  it  also  explains  the  comparatively  small 
gains  of  the  preceding  decade,  growth  being  princi- 
pally in  the  outer  belt.  St.  Louis  grew  from  350,000 

19* 


CHAP.  V. 


Berlin,  New 
York,  Chi- 
cago, and 
Philadelphia. 


Hamburg, 

Boston,  and 
Baltimore. 


Leipsic,  St. 
Louis,  and 
San  Fran- 
cisco. 


294 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Munich, 
Breslau,  and 
Cincinnati. 


Cologne, 

Cleveland, 

Buffalo,  and 

Pittsburg. 


Dresden  and 
New  Orleans. 


Detroit, 
Magdeburg, 
and  Milwau- 
kee. 


in  1880  to  nearly  452,000  in  1890.  But  Leipsic  has 
grown  at  a  much  higher  rate.  It  has  now  well-dis- 
tanced San  Francisco,  which  was  considerably  the 
larger  in  the  seventies. 

Munich,  which  has  now  been  slightly  outgrown  by 
Leipsic,  though  formerly  much  the  larger  of  the  two, 
is  still  growing  at  a  very  respectable  rate.  In  1875 
its  denizens  were  193,000  in  number,  and  in  1880, 
230,000.  In  1890  they  were  349,000.  It  has  grown  at 
a  much  higher  rate  in  the  past  decade  or  two  than 
the  American  cities  of  corresponding  size.  Breslau, 
the  second  city  of  Prussia,  has  lost  much  by  emigra- 
tion ;  but  still  it  grows.  Its  population  had  expanded 
from  272,900  in  1880  to  335,200  in  1890.  Meanwhile 
Cincinnati  had  grown  from  255,139  to  296,908. 

In  the  same  decade  Cologne  had  grown  from  144,- 
800  to  281,800.  This  may  be  compared  with  the  gain 
of  Cleveland  (Ohio)  from  160,000  to  261,000;  with 
Buffalo's  growth  from  155,000  to  255,600;  and  Pitts- 
burg's  from  156,000  to  238,600.  Cologne  was  very 
much  the  smallest  of  the  four  in  1880,  and  very 
much  the  largest  of  the  four  in  1890.  Yet  Buffalo, 
Pittsburg,  and  Cleveland  have  been  accounted  most 
remarkable  for  their  expansion  in  that  decade.  Dres- 
den, the  charming  Saxon  capital,  had  220,800  people 
in  1880,  and  New  Orleans,  our  own  charming  south- 
ern capital,  had  216,000.  Thus  they  were  of  nearly 
equal  size.  In  1890  Dresden  had  grown  to  276,500, 
and  New  Orleans  to  242,000.  A  difference  of  less 
than  5000  had  increased  to  one  of  nearly  35,000.  De- 
troit and  Milwaukee  had  each  approximately  205,000 
people  in  1890,  and  Magdeburg,  Prussia,  had  202,000. 
But  Detroit  and  Milwaukee  had  each  about  116,000  in 
1880,  while  Magdeburg  had  only  97,500.  It  should  be 
explained  that  Magdeburg  during  the  decade  had  an- 
nexed some  large  suburbs ;  but  it  remains  true  that 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


295 


its  rate  of  growth  compares  favorably  with  that  of 
these  two  American  cities.  Frankf  ort-on-the-Main  had 
180,000  people  by  the  census  of  1890,  and  Newark,  New 
Jersey,  had  181,800.  Frankfort  had  136,800  in  1880, 
and  Newark  had  136,500. 

Hanover  in  the  ten  years  had  grown  from  122,800 
to  163,600,  and  Konigsberg  from  122,600  to  161,500 ; 
Louisville,  Kentucky,  had  in  the  same  period  grown 
from  123,758  to  161,129,  and  Jersey  City  had  grown 
from  120,722  to  163,003.  Hanover  and  Konigsberg 
had  gained  faster  than  Louisville,  but  not  quite  so 
fast  as  Jersey  City.  Each  of  the  four  had  added 
about  forty  thousand  to  its  numbers.  Minneapolis, 
which  ranks  with  these  four  in  size,  though  somewhat 
exceeding  them  all,  had  a  growth  in  the  first  half  of 
the  decade  that  was  wholly  exceptional.  But  in  the 
last  half  it  grew  not  much  faster  than  a  number 
of  German  cities  of  similar  rank.  Neither  did  Kan- 
sas City,  nor  St.  Paul,  nor  Omaha.  Minneapolis  had 
129,000  in  1885  and  164,700  in  1890.  Magdeburg 
much  outdid  that  record.  St.  Paul  had  111,000  in 
1885  and  133,156  in  1890.  Diisseldorf,  with  95,000 
in  1880,  had  115,000  in  1885,  and  144,680  in  1890  — 
which  quite  distances  St.  Paul.  Chemnitz,  that  stir- 
ring factory  town  of  Saxony,  with  95,000  in  1880,  and 
110,800  in  1885,  had  138,955  in  1890  —  again  distanc- 
ing St.  Paul  and  its  American  group. 

Altona,  Hamburg's  next-door  neighbor,  had  grown 
from  91,000  to  143,000  in  ten  years,  while  Albany,  the 
capital  of  New  York,  beginning  at  just  the  same 
point  — 91,000  in  1880  — had  only  grown  to  95;000. 
Rochester,  New  York,  had  89,366  inhabitants  (about 
as  many  as  Altona)  in  1880,  and  133,896  in  1890,  while 
Altona  had  143,000.  Chemnitz  also  had  fully  kept 
its  lead  on  Rochester,  Our  prosperous  and  growing 
manufacturing  city  of  Providence,  from  which  many 


CHAP.  V. 


Frankfort 
and  Newark. 


Hanover, 

Konigsberg, 
Louisville, 

Jersey  City, 
and  Minne- 
apolis. 


Diisseldorf, 
Chemnitz, 
St.  Paul. 


Altona, 

Albany, 

Rochester. 


296 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 

Nuremberg 
•nd  Provi- 
dence. 


Relative 
growth  in 
general. 


A  compari- 
son of  ad- 
vantages and 
disadvan- 
tages. 


cultivated  men  and  women  have  gone  to  visit  that 
"quaint  and  stationary"  old  German  town,  Nurem- 
berg, has  probably  never  reflected,  when  congratu- 
lating itself  upon  a  growth  from  104,857  in  1880  to 
132,146  in  1890,  that  "old"  Nuremberg,  starting  with 
only  99,519  in  1880  — more  than  5000  behind  Provi- 
dence—  had  increased  to  142,523  in  1890,  more  than 
10,000  ahead  of  Providence. 

Doubtless  the  comparison  begins  to  grow  tedious ; 
but  otherwise  one  might  show  Indianapolis,  Allegheny, 
Columbus,  Syracuse,  Worcester,  Toledo,  Richmond, 
New  Haven,  Paterson,  Lowell,  Nashville,  Scranton, 
Fall  River,  and  all  the  rest,  how  their  growth  has 
been  matched  or  perhaps  surpassed  by  that  of  nourish- 
ing commercial  and  manufacturing  towns  of  like  size 
in  Germany — such  towns  as  Elberfeld,  Barmen,  Stet- 
tin, Crefeld,  Halle,  Braunschweig,  Dortmund,  Mann- 
heim, Essen,  and  a  dozen  more.  Some  of  the  specific 
comparisons  I  have  made  might  be  somewhat  affected 
on  one  side  or  the  other  if  every  annexation  of  suburbs 
were  taken  into  account.  But  no  such  reckoning 
would  change  the  general  impression.  And  if  the 
figures  were  revised  to  extend  the  comparison  to  the 
year  1895,  the  exhibition  of  swift  growth  in  the  Ger- 
man towns  would  appear  still  more  remarkable. 

"When  one  ventures  to  suggest  that  the  American 
cities  are  meagerly  provided  with  the  best  modern 
facilities,  and  make  but  a  sorry  show  in  comparison 
with  European  cities,  there  comes  the  unfailing  reply 
that  ours  are  in  their  infancy,  while  those  of  Europe 
are  venerable  with  age  and  rich  in  the  accumulations 
of  a  long  realized  maturity.  The  existence  of  old 
churches  and  castles,  and  of  various  monuments  and 
collections  illustrating  the  history  of  art,  has  given 
the  impression  that  the  European  cities  are  old.  But 
for  the  purposes  of  our  discussion  they  are  younger 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK 


297 


CHAP.  v. 


than  their  American  counterparts.    Their  citizens  are 

not  nearly  as  rich  as  those  of  our  cities.     They  suf- 

fer under  the  disadvantage  of   loss  in  productive 

energy  and  wealth  through  the  emigration  of  hun- 

dreds of  thousands  of  their  best  young  men  after 

they  have  reared  and  educated  them.     They  stagger 

under  such  heavy  burdens  of  taxation  and  compul- 

sory service  to  maintain  the  military  arm  of  the 

general  government,  that  the  tax  increment  which  can 

be  spared  for  municipal  purposes  comes  with  pain,    Heavy  bur- 

and  is  small  compared  with  the  revenues  we  can 

raise  for  local  outlay  in  America,  where  taxes  for 

national  and  State  purposes  are  comparatively  light. 

And  yet,  in  the  face  of  disadvantages  far  greater  than 

any  that  we  can  present  as  excuses,  the  German  cities 

have  grappled  with  the  new  municipal  problems  of 

the  last  quarter  of  a  century,  and  have  solved  them 

far  more  promptly  and  completely  than  the  American 

cities  have  done. 

The  physical  transformation  of  these  cities  has 
been  very  remarkable.  The  ground-plan  of  the 
modern  city  is  an  essential  consideration  ;  and  there 
has  been  much  reconstruction  of  old-time  thorough- 
fares in  the  central  districts  of  German  cities,  while 
the  newer  parts  have  been  laid  out  with  care  and 


and 

good  judgment.  The  suburban  tendency  is  the  key  tendencfes. 
to  recent  municipal  development  everywhere.  This 
tendency  demands  the  distinct  recognition  of  a  series 
of  main  thoroughfares  that  shall  make  easy  the 
movement  of  population  to  and  from  the  business 
center.  No  such  condition  of  things  was  recognized 
fifty  years  ago.  All  the  German  cities  are  now  ad- 
justing their  street  systems  to  the  demands  for  quick 
transit.  The  usual  American  system  is  the  simple 
checkerboard.  The  German  system  is  a  combination 
of  the  radial  and  concentric  with  the  rectangular  and 


298 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 


German 
thorough- 
fares. 


Good  road- 
ways. 


Berlin 
pavements. 


Some  Ameri- 
can com- 
parisons. 


Hanover  as 
an  .instance. 


parallel ;  and  it  needs  no  argument  to  show  that  the 
combination  system  is  by  far  the  most  convenient. 
Main  thoroughfares  in  the  German  cities  are  to-day 
more  conveniently  planned  and  carried  through  than 
in  most  American  cities. 

Good  streets  are  to  the  modern  town  what  the 
circulatory  system  is  to  a  living  organism.  It  is 
not  necessary  in  Germany  to  argue  that  good  road- 
ways are  cheap  at  any  cost,  and  that  bad  ones  are 
so  disastrously  expensive  that  only  a  very  rich  coun- 
try like  the  United  States  can  afford  them.  New 
York  has  begun  to  construct  good  pavements,  but 
it  lays  them  gradually  and  cautiously;  and  for  the 
most  part  the  existing  pavements  are  wretched. 
Berlin  adopted  asphalt  more  than  twenty  years  ago, 
and  has  been  increasing  its  use  year  by  year,  though 
most  of  the  city  is  paved  with  stone  blocks.  The 
maintenance  of  the  streets  in  general  is  so  much 
better  than  anything  in  America  that  comparisons 
are  humiliating.  There  is  no  reason  in  the  nature 
of  things  why  the  streets  of  Hanover,  which  are 
beautifully  paved  and  kept,  should  be  better  than 
those  of  Jersey  City  or  Newark,  which  cities  are  as 
large  as  Hanover,  and  as  rich,  though  their  streets  are 
probably  the  meanest  and  forlornest  in  the  whole 
civilized  world.  The  Dresden .  streets  are  much  su- 
perior to  those  of  our  one  exceptional  city,  Washing- 
ton; and  those  of  Hamburg,  Munich,  Leipsic,  and 
most  of  the  smaller  German  cities,  are  far  better 
than  those  of  American  cities  in  general. 

I  have  mentioned  Hanover  because  it  is  not  in 
any  wise  an  exceptional  German  city  in  the  manner 
and  completeness  of  its  modern  physical  transfor- 
mation, and  because  it  is  one  of  the  many  places 
that  travelers  usually  omit  as  uninteresting.  It  is 
comparable  in  size  with  Jersey  City,  Newark,  Louis- 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK  299 

ville,  or  Minneapolis.  It  typifies  the  spirit  of  pro-  CHAP.  v. 
gress  and  improvement  now  visible  in  nearly  all  the 
German  towns.  They  are  growing  fast  as  railroad 
and  manufacturing  cities,  and  are  developing  a  com- 
mendable degree  of  civic  pride.  The  remaking  of 
the  snug,  compact  little  hauptstadte  (capital  towns) 
of  petty  German  principalities  into  modern  industrial 
communities  is  a  striking  and  a  noteworthy  process. 
Nearly  every  important  place  in  Germany  has  at  some 
time  been  the  seat  of  government  of  an  ambitious 
king,  or  prince,  or  margrave,  or  elector.  The  idea 
of  the  greater  Germany  has  been  completely  trium- 
phant ;  but  these  capital  towns  have  gained  more  than 
they  have  lost.  For  many  of  them,  however,  it  is 
now  proving  fortunate  that  the  ridiculous  little  poten-  r^  new 
tate  had  his  day.  His  ambition  often  led  him  to  pre-  S^capitabf 
serve  extensive  private  gardens  and  pleasure-grounds, 
to  erect  creditable  palaces  and  public  buildings,  and 
to  lay  out  at  least  a  few  broad  and  tree-lined  avenues 
as  supports  of  his  dignity.  Such  public  appoint- 
ments, now  becoming  municipalized,  form  valuable 
features  of  rapidly  extending  towns,  and  conduce 
greatly  to  the  popular  health,  comfort,  and  pleasure. 
Even  where  the  local  potentate  and  his  court  sur- 
vive, an  entirely  new  spirit  is  shown;  and  royal 
grounds,  galleries,  and  avenues  are  treated  as  public 
rather  than  private  possessions. 

In  Hanover  one  is  strongly  impressed  with  this 
transformation  of  an  old  seat  of  government  into  a 
new  railroad  and  manufacturing  town.   The  old  town 
remains   almost   intact,   enveloped    in   a  new  town 
covering  several  times  as  large  an  area.     A  hand- 
some palace  has  been  made  over  into  one  of  the  The  modem 
largest  and  finest  technical  colleges  in  the  world —     Hanover. 
an  institution  that  ministers  directly  to  the  practical 
industrial  life  of  the  town.    Ducal  grounds  are  used 


300 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Opportuni- 
ties of  cul- 
ture. 


Municipal 
appoint- 
ments. 


as  municipal  parks.  Street-railway  tracks  run  on 
splendid  old  avenues  leading  out  to  what  were  in 
earlier  days  the  country  or  suburban  residences  of 
ruling  families.  The  old  business  streets,  with  quaint, 
antiquated  houses,  are  now  paved  with  smooth  new 
asphalt.  Just  outside  the  town,  on  almost  every  side, 
are  the  tall  stacks  of  new  manufacturing  establish- 
ments. New  business  streets  have  the  freshness  of 
an  American  city,  with  the  advantages  of  evener  and 
more  becoming  architecture,  and  of  much  better 
paving  and  cleansing.  The  people  of  Hanover  now 
possess,  as  a  community,  many  of  the  advantages 
that  formerly  belonged  alone  to  the  ruling  family 
and  court.  They  are  a  thoroughly  modernized  com- 
munity. They  enjoy  admirable  school  advantages; 
they  have  access  to  public  libraries  containing  several 
hundred  thousand  volumes;  at  their  disposal  for 
education  or  entertainment  are  picture-  and  sculpture- 
galleries,  museums,  and  various  other  collections. 

The  city  has  magnificent  new  water- works ;  it  owns 
fine  central  slaughter-houses  and  cattle-markets ;  has 
convenient  and  well-inspected  produce-markets;  pos- 
sesses a  good  modern  sewer-system;  owns  disinfection 
establishments  and  epidemic  hospitals;  has  a  well- 
organized  system  of  sanitary  administration  with  in- 
spection corps ;  is  supplied  with  ordinary  hospitals  and 
institutions  for  the  relief  of  poverty ;  and,  in  short? 
maintains  a  full  complement  of  the  establishments 
and  "plants"  that  pertain  to  the  well-regulated  city 
of  this  last  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Its 
rules  and  municipal  ordinances  form  a  highly  in- 
structive body  of  municipal  literature.  The  new 
building  regulations,  as  revised  in  1888,  comprise  a 
valuable  code  that  brings  every  detail  of  construc- 
tion under  strict  rule  and  under  the  surveillance  of 
the  authorities.  The  code  of  street  regulations,  and 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


301 


that  which  has  to  do  with  protection  against  fire,  are 
in  like  manner  minute  and  important.  Yet  Hanover 
makes  no  pretensions  whatever,  and  would  assert  no 
claim  as  a  model  or  an  exception.  It  is  not  rich,  and 
the  adaptation  of  old  surviving  buildings,  grounds, 
and  establishments  has  not  saved  any  great  sum  of 
money,  and  does  not  account  for  the  completeness 
of  the  existing  appointments.  Hanover  has  been 
modernized  through  the  intelligent  and  wise  appli- 
cation of  business  principles  and  methods  to  the  con- 
duct of  municipal  housekeeping. 

Having  recognized  the  significance  and  the  value  of 
the  suburban  tendency,  the  German  cities  are  now 
undertaking  to  control  the  forms  of  their  expansion, 
and  to  prevent  errors  that  would  require  costly  fu- 
ture remedies.  Annexations  of  outlying  territory  are 
the  order  of  the  day.  Since  1870  most  of  the  German 
cities  have  widened  their  bounds  —  some  of  them  very 
materially.  Munich  has  annexed  extensive  suburbs, 
notably  in  1890,  with  a  further  addition  in  1892; 
Leipsic  in  1889,  1890,  and  1891  brought  in  large  bod- 
ies of  suburban  population,  and  annexed  territory 
which  makes  it  three  and  a  half  times  as  large  as  it 
was  before  1889.  Dresden  in  1892  and  1893  made 
material  annexations.  Cologne,  which  was  one  of  the 
most  congested  and  constricted  of  the  German  cities, 
is  now,  by  virtue  of  its  great  acquisitions  of  1888, 
much  the  largest  of  them  all.  Berlin,  Munich,  Ham- 
burg, and  Frankfort  are  now  of  about  equal  area, 
averaging  somewhere  near  7000  hectares  (the  hectare 
being  about  two  and  one  half  acres),  or  from  twenty- 
five  to  thirty  square  miles.  Berlin  will  make  very 
large  acquisitions  in  the  early  future,  definite  steps 
having  already  been  taken  to  annex  a  wide  suburban 
zone.  Cologne's  new  boundaries  include  11,000  hec- 
tares, and  embrace  much  garden  and  farming  land. 


CHAP.  V. 


A.  triumph  of 
good  govern- 
ment. 


Annexation 
of  suburbs. 


Munich, 
Leipsie, 
Dresden. 


Berlin's  pro- 
posed exten- 
sions. 


302 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Cologne's 
policy. 


Magdeburg, 

Hanover, 

and  other 

towns. 


Public  con- 
trol of  pri- 
vate build- 
ing. 


Accommo- 
dation for 
railways. 


But  the  municipality  will  be  enabled  —  for  purposes 
of  the  extension  of  the  street,  drainage,  and  transit 
systems,  and  the  water  and  gas  supplies,  for  park 
purposes,  and  for  the  regulation  of  building  —  to  con- 
trol from  the  outset  an  area  surely  destined  to  con- 
tain a  large  population.  Magdeburg  nearly  doubled 
its  area  in  1886  and  1887.  Hanover  in  1891  and  1892 
extended  its  limits  from  seven  square  miles  to  about 
sixteen;  and  Altona,  Chemnitz,  Bremen,  Karlsruhe, 
and  other  towns,  have  in  recent  years  widened  their 
precincts.  The  movement  has,  however,  only  fairly 
begun ;  and  the  next  ten  years  will  almost  certainly 
witness  a  development  of  superficies,  and  a  distribu- 
tion of  now  congested  population-masses,  that  will 
quite  eclipse  the  achievements  of  the  period  1870-90. 
The  rapid  growth  of  these  German  cities  has  been  at- 
tended, of  course,  with  much  speculative  building,  and 
the  laying  out  of  divers  new  quarters  by  private  com- 
panies. Berlin  has  been  built  up  in  this  fashion,  and 
Hamburg,  Munich,  Leipsic,  Dresden,  and  the  other 
large  towns,  all  afford  abundant  examples.  But  the 
municipal  authorities  regulate  in  the  severest  fashion 
the  arrangement  and  width  of  the  new  streets  thus 
formed,  require  the  best  of  paving,  demand  all  that 
could  be  desired  as  to  sewers,  and  govern  the  charac- 
ter of  the  buildings  as  to  materials,  height,  street- 
lining,  and  general  appearance.  Thus  the  greed  of 
speculators  is  not  allowed  to  mar  the  harmonious  de- 
velopment of  the  city,  or  to  endanger  its  future 
health  by  bad  construction  and  inferior  sanitary  ar- 
rangements. 

It  is  worth  while  to  note,  as  regards  the  forms  of 
German  cities,  that  the  municipal  authorities  fully 
recognize  the  vital  importance  of  railways  to  a  town's 
commercial  prosperitj1",  and  understand  that  adequate 
and  convenient  terminal  facilities  both  for  passengers 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,—  ITS  FEAMEWORK  303 

and  for  goods  ought  to  be  as  fully  considered  by  the     CHAP.  v. 

city  government  as  the  provision  of  proper  thorough- 

fares for  ordinary  street-traffic.     One  of  the  most  se- 

rious mistakes  that  our  American  cities  have  made  is 

their  failure  to  provide  suitably  for  the  entrance  and  An  essential 

exit  of  railroads,  and  for  the   central   station  and 

yard  room  that  railway  traffic  requires.     Even  our 

newer  cities  have  neglected  this  matter  with  a  stupid- 

ity that  is  almost  unaccountable  in  view  of  the  fact 

that  nowadays  the  one  question  of  railway  terminals 

often  decides  the  commercial  fate  of  a  town.    The 

European  State  railway  systems  are  more  fortunate 

than  the  English  and  American  private  systems  in 

finding  the  towns  disposed  to  grant  the  necessary  fa- 

cilities for  the  transaction  of  their  business.    Leipsic, 

for  instance,  has  become  a  great  railway  center,  and 

one  is  impressed  with  the  excellent  judgment  shown 


in  the  location  of  the  extensive  railroad  yards,  and  of 
the  factories,  which  lie  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town 
and  have  perfectly  convenient  shipping  facilities. 
Stuttgart,  also,  affords  an  excellent  instance  of  admi- 
rable central  railway  facilities.  Terminal  arrange-  At  Stuttgart 
ments  at  Berlin  are  magnificent;  and  the  whole 
movement  of  traffic,  both  freight  and  passenger,  is 
facilitated  to  a  remarkable  degree  by  the  stadtbahn  or 
municipal  railroad,  crossing  the  city  from  east  to  At  Berlin. 
west,  and  the  ringbahn,  an  encircling  railway  operated 
in  conjunction  with  the  stadtbahn.  These  connect 
with  all  the  lines  that  come  to  Berlin,  and  assist  in  the 
collection,  distribution,  and  transfer  of  freightage. 

Furthermore,  it  is  made  a  municipal  function  in 
Germany  to  utilize  to  the  highest  advantage  any  wa-  water-ways. 
ter-ways  that  a  city  may  possess.  Hamburg  is  the 
most  noteworthy  instance.  It  lies  at  the  head  of 
tidal  water,  on  the  estuary  of  the  Elbe,  and  it  has  had 
the  enterprise,  at  vast  expense,  within  the  past  decade 


304 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Hamburg's 

harbor  and 

docks. 


Berlin's  util- 
ization of 
the  Spree. 


Dresden  and 
the  Elbe. 


The  struc- 
ture of  mu- 
nicipal gov- 
ernment. 


to  create  the  finest  harbor  and  dock  facilities  in  the 
whole  world.  The  docks  are  provided  with  a  net- 
work of  railway  tracks  and  splendid  public  storage- 
houses,  and  thus  the  highways  for  the  accommoda- 
tion of  the  larger  traffic  of  the  ocean-going  ships 
are  as  perfect  as  those  for  ordinary  street-traffic. 
And  the  city  is  directly  or  indirectly  a  very  great 
gainer  from  these  splendid  public  works.  At  Berlin, 
the  most  casual  observer  can  hardly  fail  to  notice  the 
marvelous  use  that  is  made  for  purposes  of  commer- 
cial navigation  of  the  narrow  river  Spree.  It  has 
been  well  dredged  out,  is  held  in  a  controllable  chan- 
nel by  magnificent  stone  embankments  extending  for 
a  number  of  miles  on  both  sides  of  the  river,  and  has, 
below  the  high  quays,  broad  and  convenient  stone 
landings  all  along  the  water-edge.  The  quantity  of 
freight  barged  at  cheap  rates  from  point  to  point  in 
the  city  by  means  of  the  Spree  is  enormous ;  and  the 
city  streets  are  thus  greatly  relieved.  Moreover,  the 
Spree  connects  with  a  system  of  canals  penetrating 
the  country  in  every  direction,  and  carrying  enor- 
mous quantities  of  heavy  ware  such  as  building  ma- 
terials. Dresden  in  a  similar  manner  derives  large 
service  from  the  Elbe ;  and  the  German  cities  in  gen- 
eral have  not  spared  expenditure  to  make  their  rivers 
or  other  navigable  water-courses  a  well-utilized  part 
of  the  arrangements  for  the  convenient  passage  of 
persons  and  traffic. 

Although  the  framework  and  general  structure  of 
the  municipal  house  are  not  of  absolutely  vital  conse- 
quence to  good  housekeeping,  they  have  a  very  con- 
siderable importance.  It  happens  that  the  Germans 
care  less  than  the  French  for  a  modern  and  regular 
system  —  one  that  shall  conform  to  geometrical  rules 
and  harmonize  with  a  philosophical  ideal.  In  the 
United  States  the  reformers  have  doubtless  at  times 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK  305 

lost  sight  of  the  aims  and  objects  of  government  in     CHAP.  v. 
striving  after  good  government  as  an  end  in  itself. 
Their  attention  has  been  devoted  to  the  structure  and 
mechanism,  and,  so  far  as  the  cities  are  concerned, 
they  keep  changing  it  perpetually.    They  are  forever 
overhauling,  repairing,  or  reconstructing  the  house, 
without  seeming  to  have  many  attractive  or  inspiring 
uses  for  which  they  are  eager  to  make  the  house  ready.      German 
The  Germans  of  our  generation,  on  the  other  hand,      a  means 

'  rather  than 

have  taken 'their  old  framework  of  city  government      an  end. 
as  they  found  it,  and  have  proceeded  to  use  it  for 
new  and  wonderful  purposes,  altering  it  somewhat 
from  time  to  time,  but  not  allowing  its  defects  to  par- 
alyze the  varied  activities  of  the  household. 

The  different  States  of  Germany — Prussia,  Saxony, 
Bavaria,  Wiirtemberg,  Baden,  and  the  rest — have  their 
distinct  municipal  systems,  prescribed  by  general  law.    The  eneial 
Variations  of  detail  are  numerous  and  marked ;  yet       ^v/s. 
the  systems  of  the  principal  States  are  essentially  sim- 
ilar.   The  Prussian  laws  providing  for  municipal  gov- 
ernment are  a  part  of  the  great  administrative  scheme 
established  in  the  legislation  of  Stein  and  Harden- 
berg  early  in  the  century.     Many  changes  have  been 
made,  but  the  municipal  constitutions  of  Prussia  re-  stein's  Pms- 

.  .  .  .  ,  ,  „    sian  reforms 

main  in  their  chief  characteristics  what  the  law  of  onsos. 
1808  made  them.  Through  the  previous  century  it 
had  been  the  Prussian  policy  to  sink  the  indepen- 
dence and  individuality  of  the  gemeinden,  the  munici- 
palities, in  the  absolutism  of  the  State ;  and  to  go  so 
far  even  as  to  treat  old  municipal  property  as  belong- 
ing to  the  State  at  large.  The  towns  had  practically 
no  freedom  in  the  management  of  their  own  local  es- 
tablishments and  institutions. 

But  all  this  was  changed  in  the  legislation  of  1808. 
As  in  the  French  municipal  laws  of  1789-90,  the  mu- 
nicipalities were  recognized  as  ancient  units  of  gov- 
20 


306 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  v.  ernment,  organic  entities,  with  their  own  properties 
and  functions,  and  with  the  right  of  entire  self-gov- 
ernment within  the  sphere  of  their  strictly  local  and 
neighborhood  concerns.  They  were  given  elective 
assemblies,  or  councils,  and  an  executive  body,  or 

The  system  .  ,    '  , 

outlined,  magistracy,  composed  01  a  burgomaster  and  a  num- 
ber of  associated  magistrates ;  —  the  burgomaster 
(mayor)  and  his  executive  corps  (magistrats-mitgUe- 
der)  being  chosen  by  the  popularly  elected  council 
(gemeinderath),  and  given  the  complete  charge  of  ad- 
ministrative work.  The  system  was  from  time  to 
time  extended  to  the  provinces  that  Prussia  absorbed. 
In  its  general  principles,  moreover,  it  was  incorporated 
in  the  laws  of  the  other  kingdoms  and  principalities 
that  with  Prussia  now  make  up  the  German  empire. 

In  Prussia,  as  in  England,  local  self-government  on 
the  plan  of  elective  councils  was  granted  to  the  large 
towns  as  municipal  corporations  long  before  anything 
similar  was  devised  either  for  rural  districts  or  for 
provinces.  But  in  the  period  1872-84  the  administra- 
iratufn "  tive  system  of  Prussia  was  reconstructed.  There  is  a 
government  new  and  comparatively  regular  series  of  provinces, 
3Sia>  districts,  and  "  circles,"  which  divisions  are  analogous 
to  French  departments,  arrondissements,  and  cantons. 
In  each  division  there  are  administrative  officers  re- 
presenting the  central  government  and  executing  the 
national  laws,  while  there  are  also  elective  councils 
with  their  standing  committees  or  magistracies  to  at- 
tend to  the  strictly  local  affairs  of  the  provinces,  dis- 
tricts, and  circles  in  accordance  with  the  now  accepted 
doctrines  of  self-government.  The  circle  consists  of 
a  group  of  rural  hamlets  and  villages;  but  every 
town  of  25,000  people  or  more  is  distinct  and  consti- 
tutes in  itself  an  "  urban  circle."  Throughout  the  en- 
tire system, —  which  is  far  more  complicated  in  its 
details  than  the  French, —  there  is  manifested  the  de- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK 


307 


termination  to  stimulate  local  progress  and  to  bring 
the  best  ability  everywhere  into  some  form  of  partici- 
pation in  the  work  of  government.1 

It  would  not  have  been  possible  in  the  Germany  of 
Stein  and  of  Frederick  William  III.  to  establish  re- 
presentative institutions  upon  a  basis  of  popular  equal- 
ity. The  Prussian  system  emphasized  the  property 
qualification;  and  that  system  remains  to-day.  The 
voters  are  those  who  pay  certain  kinds  of  taxes  above 
a  minimum  amount,  and  this  restriction  excludes  per- 
haps ten  or  fifteen  per  cent,  of  the  men  of  voting  age. 
The  electoral  system  is  somewhat  complicated.  A 
city  —  Berlin,  for  instance  —  is  laid  off  in  a  number 
of  electoral  districts.  The  voters  are  listed  in  the  or- 
der of  the  sums  they  pay  for  taxes,  with  the  heaviest 
tax-payer  heading  the  list.  They  are  then  divided 
into  three  classes,  each  of  which  has  paid  one  third  of 
the  aggregate  amount.  Thus,  the  first  class  will  con- 
tain a  group  of  very  heavy  tax-payers,  the  second 
will  be  made  up  of  a  much  larger  number  of  men  of 
moderate  fortune  and  income,  and  the  third  class  will 
comprise  the  great  mass  of  workingmen  and  small 
tax-payers.  Each  class  in  a  given  district  elects  a 
member  of  the  gemeinderath,  or  town  council. 

In  large  parts  of  the  German  empire  the  class 
system  is  not  maintained.  The  Berlin  system  is,  how- 
ever, the  most  prevalently  typical  for  Germany  at 
large.  At  a  recent  Berlin  election  (1893)  held  in  one 
third  of  the  districts,  for  the  renewal  of  one  third 
of  the  council,  there  were  registered  as  qualified 
voters  111,637  men,  of  whom  2045  were  in  the  first 
class,  13,049  in  the  second,  and  96,543  in  the  third. 

1  An  excellent  account  of  the  system  of  provincial  and  local 
government  in  Prussia,  by  Professor  F.  J.  Goodnow,  was  pub- 
lished in  the  "  Political  Science  Quarterly  "  for  December,  1889, 
and  March,  1890. 


CHAP.  V. 


Three-class 
electoral 
system. 


A  Berlin 
election. 


308 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Essen  as  an 
extreme 
instance. 


It  happened  that  of  these  classes  976,  4858,  and 
25,596  actually  appeared  at  the  polls  —  considerably 
less  than  one  third  of  those  empowered  to  vote.  The 
first-class  voters  participated  in  the  highest  propor- 
tion. But  each  class  chooses  its  third  of  the  munici- 
pal council,  regardless  of  the  force  it  musters  on 
election  day.  An  extreme  instance  of  the  prepon- 
derance that  this  system  gives  to  wealth  is  afforded 
by  the  manufacturing  city  of  Essen,  where  in  a  pop- 
ulation approaching  100,000  there  is  a  mere  hand- 
ful of  persons  who  pay  one  third  of  all  the  taxes, 
and  are  therefore  empowered  to  designate  one  third 
of  the  councilors.  The  Krupp  gun-works  form  the 
great  industry  of  Essen,  and  at  a  recent  municipal 
election  one  voter  appeared  for  the  first  class  and 
counted  for  quite  as  much  as  the  nearly  two  thou- 
sand men  who  appeared  for  the  third  class.  The 
statistics  of  a  still  later  election  at  Essen  show  that 
4  men  belonged  to  the  first  class,  353  to  the  second, 
and  12,197  to  the  third,  and  that  2,  243,  and  5367 
actually  voted  in  the  three  classes.  In  the  cities  of 
Saxony,  Bavaria,  and  Wiirtemberg,  the  three-class 
system  is  not  in  vogue;  but  there  are  considerable 
restrictions  upon  the  franchise. 

So  far  as  the  voters  are  concerned, — whether  in 
Berlin,  Breslau,  Cologne,  Magdeburg,  and  the  other 
cities  where  the  class  system  remains,  or  in  Stuttgart, 
Munich,  Leipsic,  or  in  any  of  the  cities  where  there 
The  munici-  are  no  discriminations  introduced  among  the  enfran- 
chised,— their  one  task  is  the  selection  of  a  good  mu- 
nicipal council.  Everything  in  the  life  of  the  gemeinde 
revolves  about  this  one  central  body.  It  finds  the 
burgomaster,  designates  his  expert  associates  of  the 
magisterial  coterie,  supplies  the  means  for  carrying 
on  the  city  government,  and  represents  in  its  own 
enlightenment,  ability,  and  aspirations  the  standard 


pal  council 
as  the  cen- 
tral fact. 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FEAMEWOEK  309 

and  the  character  of  the  community's  progress.  It  CHAP.  v. 
is  to  this  body  that  one  must  go  to  discover  the 
secret  of  the  consistency  and  continuity  of  German 
municipal  policy.  Much  of  the  detail  of  the  organi- 
zation and  method  of  German  city  government  would 
only  appear  tedious  and  cumbersome  if  an  attempt 
were  made  to  describe  it  all.  But  I  must  beg  per- 
mission to  make  as  emphatic  as  possible  this  funda- 
mental point,  that  such  city  government  has  its  focus 
in  the  elected  municipal  council.  However  peculiar 
in  a  hundred  details  the  German  system  may  be,  it  is  ™3  in  <?oin- 
like  the  English  and  the  French  systems  in  the  main  English  and 

„  ,,  ,®  ,  ,.  French  sys- 

tact  that  the  voters  elect  a  representative  common  terns. 
council,  of  considerable  size  and  sitting  in  one  cham- 
ber, which  has  in  its  hands  for  exercise  directly  or 
indirectly  the  whole  authority  that  exists  in  the  mu- 
nicipality. It  is  a  body  large  enough  to  contain  men 
of  various  opinions,  and  it  acts  openly,  with  full  re- 
sponsibility. 

Stability  in  the  German  municipal  councils  is  se- 
cured by  partial  renewal.  Thus  the  councilors  of 
Berlin  and  the  Prussian  cities  are  elected  for  six 

Six-year 

years,  and  one  third  of  the  seats  are  vacated  and    terms.  **- 

•  '  newal  by 

refilled  every  two  years.  In  Berlin  there  are  forty-  thirds. 
two  electoral  districts,  and  these  are  arranged  in  three 
groups  of  fourteen  each.  Each  group  elects  its  coun- 
cilors in  its  turn.  Thus  group  I.  chose  its  forty-two 
councilors  in  1889,  group  II.  had  its  turn  in  1891, 
and  group  III.  renewed  its  representation  in  1893. 
Each  district  elects  three  councilors,  corresponding 
to  the  three  classes  of  voters,  and  thus  each  group 
contributes  forty-two  to  a  total  elective  council  of 
126  members.  Taking  the  German  cities  in  general, 
the  most  usual  period  for  which  councilors  are  elected 
is  six  years,  with  the  plan  of  renewal  in  three  instal- 
ments. But  Strassburg  and  Metz  retain  the  French 
20* 


310 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Nine-year 
terms  in 
Bavaria. 


Three-year 
plan  in 
Saxony. 


Size  of 
councils. 


General 

European 

conclusions. 


In  the  Ger- 
man cities. 


A  matter  of 

practical 
importance. 


system  of  entire  renewal  at  each  election,  their  pe- 
riod being  five  years.  Munich,  Nuremberg,  and 
the  Bavarian  towns,  on  the  other  hand,  give  their 
councilors  nine-year  terms,  and  renew  one  third  of 
the  body  every  three  years.  Dresden,  Chemnitz, 
and  other  Saxon  towns  are  like  the  English  muni- 
cipalities in  giving  councilors  three-year  terms 
with  annual  renewals  of  one  third  the  member- 
ship; and  Stuttgart  renews  one  half  of  its  coun- 
cil every  year.  But  the  six-year  term  is  most 
prevalent,  and  most  characteristic  of  the  German 
system. 

European  cities  all  the  way  from  Scotland  to  Hun- 
gary would  seem  to  have  arrived  by  somewhat  in- 
dependent processes  at  similar  conclusions  as  to  the 
advantageous  size  of  the  popular  municipal  body. 
Thus  the  great  capitals  have  found  a  body  of  a  hun- 
dred members,  more  or  less,  a  convenient  size.  The 
London  county  council  has  138  members,  the  Berlin 
council  126,  the  Paris  council  80  with  prospect  of 
enlargement  to  more  than  100,  and  the  new  Vienna 
council  has  138.  Large  commercial  towns,  or  minor 
capitals,  find  a  body  of  from  40  to  60  men  the  most 
satisfactory.  Such  is  the  size  of  the  councils  of  the 
great  British  towns,  and  of  the  principal  French  and 
Italian  cities.  Making  comparison  with  Germany, 
we  find  that  Munich  and  Leipsic  have  councils  of  60 
members,  Dresden  one  of  72,  Breslau  a  body  of  about 
100,  Cologne  one  of  45,  Frankfort  one  of  57,  Mag- 
deburg of  72,  Chemnitz  of  48,  Strassburg  of  36,  Al- 
tona  of  35,  and  Stuttgart  of  only  25.  The  average 
for  all  German  cities,  taking  a  list  of  forty  of  the  most 
important  ones,  would  be  a  municipal  council  of  about 
fifty  members.  This  is  not  a  matter  of  minor  detail, 
nor  do  I  adduce  it  from  a  mere  fondness  for  the 
statistical.  In  constituting  our  American  State  legis- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


311 


latures  we  have  shown  some  grasp  of  the  question 
how  large  to  make  the  representative  bodies ;  but  in 
forming  our  American  city  governments  we  have 
been  utterly  at  sea,  and  have  produced  results  of  the 
most  whimsical  and  bewildering  variety.  European 
conclusions  need  not  be  accepted  as  a  guide,  but  they 
may  on  the  other  hand  be  usefully  noted  for  pur- 
poses of  comparison. 

Municipal  councilors  in  Germany  are,  as  a  rule, 
very  excellent  citizens.  It  is  considered  a  high  honor 
to  be  elected  to  the  council.  Membership  is  a  title 
of  dignity  that  merchants,  professional  men,  and 
scholars  are  usually  eager  to  hold.  No  salaries  are 
paid  to  the  councilors,  and  a  penalty  is  attached  to 
refusal  to  serve  if  elected.  The  sentiment  toward 
these  positions  is  much  the  same  in  Germany  as  in 
Great  Britain,  though  stronger  with  men  of  high 
education  in  the  German  than  in  the  British  towns. 
The  reelection  of  good  councilors  term  after  term 
is  common  in  both  countries.  It  would  be  difficult 
to  estimate  fairly  the  influence  of  the  class  system 
in  Prussia  upon  the  character  of  city  councils  as  re- 
gards their  conservatism,  intelligence,  and  business 
ability.  Undoubtedly  the  recent  growth  of  the  social 
democracy  would  have  a  sharper  influence  upon  the 
city  councils  if  the  class  system  were  abolished,  and 
if  the  municipal  franchise  were  made  identical  with 
the  simple  manhood  suffrage  that  exists  for  pur- 
poses of  representation  in  the  imperial  legislature, 
the  Reichstag.  Thus  in  France,  with  universal  suf- 
frage, the  socialists  have  of  late  been  entering  mu- 
nicipal politics  with  much  zeal,  in  pursuance  of  the 
plan  of  an  increased  communal  activity  for  the  bene- 
fit of  the  masses.  Already  the  German  cities  would 
appear  from  the  viewpoint  of  other  countries  to  be 
far  advanced  in  socialistic  undertakings ;  yet  it  must 


CHAP.  V. 


High  char- 
acter of 
municipal 
councilors. 


Influence  of 
the  class 
system. 


Socialism 
and  the 
suffrage. 


312 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 

A  thrifty 
burgher  col- 
lectivism. 


Proprietors 

iu  the 
councils. 


In  Saxony 
an  equal 
division. 


Reasons  for 
this  require- 
ment. 


Scientists 
and  special- 
ists in  the 
councils. 


not  be  forgotten  that  the  mnnicipal  ideals  of  a  thrifty 
burgher  collectivism  and  those  of  the  social  democ- 
racy in  German  cities,  may  tend  as  far  asunder  as 
those  of  the  bourgeoisie  and  the  proletariate  in  France. 
As  yet  the  German  city  governments  are  in  the  hands 
of  the  educated  and  thrifty  classes.  What  social 
overturning  will  some  day  give  these  splendid  busi- 
ness machines  into  the  keeping  of  the  working-classes 
is  a  speculative  topic  that  may  be  suggested  here, 
but  need  not  be  discussed. 

The  characteristics,  to  some  extent,  of  German  city 
councils  may  be  inferred  from  the  number  of  real- 
estate  proprietors  in  them.  It  is  common  to  require 
that  a  certain  proportion  at  least  shall  be  house- 
owners.  In  Berlin  about  three  fourths  of  the  coun- 
cilors are  proprietors,  and  in  Breslau  nearly  as  many. 
In  Frankfort,  Hanover,  Diisseldorf,  Nuremberg,  and 
many  of  the  smaller  cities,  the  house-owners  are 
eighty  or  ninety  per  cent,  of  the  total  number  of 
councilors.  But  in  the  Saxon  cities,  as  Leipsic, 
Dresden,  and  Chemnitz,  and  in  a  few  others  elsewhere, 
existing  laws  require  that  one  half  the  councilors 
shall  be  house-owners,  and  that  one  half  shall  not  be. 
This  provision  is  supposed  to  protect  property  in- 
terests in  a  group  of  cities  which,  as  I  have  already 
explained,  do  not  give  any  excess  of  representation 
to  propertied  voters  under  a  class  system.  The  great 
mass  of  citizens  are  of  course  renters  of  apartments 
in  "flat"-  or  tenement-houses,  and  they  are  assured 
a  full  half  of  the  municipal  council  that  has  to  ad- 
just taxation,  and  must  of  necessity  determine  ques- 
tions in  which  the  interests  of  the  occupying  and  the 
owning  classes  would  seem  to  differ.  The  presence 
of  men  eminent  for  scientific,  economic,  or  other 
expert  knowledge  is  another  of  the  characteristics 
of  the  German  councils.  Thus  the  Berlin  body,  as 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK  313 

those  of  other  university  cities,  contains  more  than     CHAP.  v. 
one  learned  professor  whose  influence  is  strongly  felt 
in  some  important  line  of  policy  or  department  of 
administration.     The  councils  form  themselves  into 
standing    committees    for    working    purposes,    and  ^t 
choose  one  of  their  own  members  as  presiding  officer, 
and   another  as  his  deputy  —  although  in  Cologne, 
Diisseldorf,  Elberfeld,   and  some  other  places,  the 
chief  burgomaster  is  brought  in  as  the  chairman  of 
the  council. 

In  addition  to  the  magistracy  and  the  council,  there 
is  in  Berlin  a  body  of  about  seventy-five  so-called 
"citizen  deputies,"  who  are  selected  by  the  council 
for  their  general  fitness  to  serve  as  associates  on  com- 
mittees charged  with  the  oversight  of  various  muni- 
cipal interests,  such  as  parks,  schools,  the  care  of  the 
poor,  and  the  sanitary  services.  They  have  no  au- 
thority to  vote  in  the  council,  but  they  illustrate,  at 
the  center  of  administration,  the  excellent  practice, 
which  is  followed  throughout  the  entire  ramification  cooperation. 
of  German  city  government,  of  enlisting  the  coopera- 
tion of  unofficial  citizens  in  managing  the  ordinary 
concerns  of  the  community. 

The  burgomaster  and  magistrates  are  the  most 
highly  trained  experts  that  a  German  city  can  secure. 
The  burgomaster  is  an  expert  in  the  general  art  of  Burgomaster 
municipal  administration.  Associated  with  him  in  auti4tet!s~ 
the  magisterial  council  are  experts  in  law,  experts  in 
finance,  experts  in  education  to  administer  the  schools, 
experts  in  engineering  to  oversee  public  works  of 
every  character,  experts  in  sanitary  science,  experts 
in  public  charity,  experts  in  forestry  and  park  man- 
agement, experts  in  the  technical  and  business  man- 
agement of  water  and  gas  supplies,  and  so  on.  The- 
analogy  would  be  far  from  perfect,  but  it  would  an- 
swer roughly  to  compare  the  governmental  structure- 


314:  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  v.     of  a  German  city  with  that  of  a  railway  corporation, 
compared    in  which  the  board  of  directors,  chosen  by  the  stock- 

with  organi-  * 

zatioiiota    holders,  appoint  a  general  superintendent  or  man- 

railway  com- 
pany,      ager,   a  general  passenger  agent,  a  general  freight 

agent,  a  chief  legal  officer,  a  chief  engineer,  a  superin- 
tendent of  motive  power,  and  other  general  officers, 
and  leave  to  these  highly  salaried  experts,  promoted 
from  inferior  places  or  drawn  from  the  service  of  va- 
rious other  transportation  companies,  almost  the  en- 
tire management  and  operation  of  the  road.  The 
shareholders  represent  the  voters  of  Berlin,  let  us 
say ;  the  board  of  directors  are  the  municipal  council ; 
the  general  superintendent  is  the  chief  burgomaster ; 
and  the  general  officers  at  the  head  of  departments 
are  the  magistrates. 

The  magistratsrath  or  stadtrafh  of  a  German  city  is, 

then,  a  body  of   distinguished  and  honored,  highly 

paid,  professional,  expert  employees,  and  not  a  body 

ti-ates  are     of  citizen-representatives :  although  experienced  mem- 

professional  „      .   .  . 

experts.  bers  of  the  body  of  citizen-representatives  may  be  — 
and  not  infrequently  are  —  promoted  to  membership 
in  the  magistratsrath.  The  professional  civil  service 
is  a  vastly  greater  and  better-established  field  of  em- 
ployment in  Germany  than  in  England  or  America, 
and  it  is  particularly  difficult  for  an  American  to  ap- 
preciate its  position  and  significance.  The  mayor  of 
an  American  city  is  usually  some  well-known  citizen, 

Burgomaster  ... 

compared  called  temporarily  from  private  life  to  occupy  the 
cau  mayor,  most  authoritative  place  in  the  corporation.  The 
burgomaster  of  a  German  city  is  a  civil  servant  — 
the  permanent  head  of  a  permanent  body  of  trained 
officials.  The  difference  between  the  two  is  some- 
what like  that  between  our  secretary  of  war  and  the 
general  commanding  the  army.  I  have  alluded  to 
possible  changes  in  the  spirit  and  the  objects  of  Ger- 
man city  governments  when  the  workingmen  shall 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK  315 

have  become  dominant  at  the  polls.    But  I  do  not  be-     CHAP.  v. 
lieve  that  there  is  any  likelihood  whatsoever  of  a 

change  in  what  we  may  call  the  method,  as  distin- 

•  i    j  £  J.T-  A-  £      j     •    •  j.      i.-  mi,    i  •      Methodsand 

guished  from  the  motive,  or  administration.  That  is  motives. 
to  say,  whatever  may  be  the  political  or  class  com- 
plexion of  the  citizens'  representative  council,  that 
body  will  continue  to  employ  experts  on  the  principle 
of  a  permanent  civil  service  to  carry  out  its  plans. 
We  may  deprecate  German  officialism  as  much  as  we 
like  ;  but  the  Germans  will  not  cease  to  manage  the 
business  affairs  of  their  municipal  corporations 
through  the  employment  of  a  trained,  professional 
service,  until  American  railway  corporations  cease  to 
seek  the  best  technical  and  expert  talent,  whether  in 
administration  or  in  engineering,  to  carry  on  their 
enterprises. 

It  may  be  useful  to  note  some  points  of  difference 
and  resemblance  between  the  German,  English,  and  comparison 
French  systems  of  executive  government  in  cities.  EngHsh^ud 
The  English  have  a  single,  central  elective  council,  to     systems. 
which  the  councilors  themselves  add  aldermen,  in  the 
proportion  of  one  sixth  of  their  own  number.     These 
aldermen  are,  almost  always,  ordinary  councilors  who 
have  served  for  several  terms,  and  have  become  es- 
pecially useful  on  account  of  their  experience.     They 
have  no  different  functions  from  councilors,  but  hold 
their  terms  for  six  instead  of  three  years,  and  are 
very  commonly  made  chairmen  of  standing  commit-    Resume  of 
tees.    The  mayor  is  designated  by  the  council  for  one      system. 
year,  and  he  is  usually  an  alderman,  his  duty  being 
simply  that  of  presiding  officer  and  titular  head  of 
the  corporation.     He  serves  on  committees  like  other 
members  of  the  council,  and  when  his  "  year  in  the 
chair  "  is  at  an  end,  he  resumes  his  place  on  the  floor. 
There  is  a  standing  committee  for  each  important 
branch  of  the  municipal  service,  and  this  committee 


316  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  v.  selects  (subject  to  confirmation  by  the  full  council)  a 
permanent,  expert  chief  of  the  department,  who  organ- 
izes it  in  detail,  and  superintends  its  operation.  Thus, 
besides  a  permanent  staff  of  high  general  officials,  such 
as  the  town  clerk,  the  borough  engineer,  and  the  med- 
ical health  officer,  there  will  be  a  superintendent  of 
water  supply,  a  chief  of  the  fire  department,  a  chief 
sanitary  officer,  a  chief  of  police,  and  various  others. 
These  experts  will  have  been  secured  upon  their  pure 
merits,  often  from  distant  cities.  The  system  works 
very  satisfactorily.  The  expert  chiefs  are  in  constant 
touch  with  the  chairmen  of  their  supervising  council 
committees,  and  always  attend  committee  meetings. 
The  whole  municipal  service  is  held  in  coordination 
through  reports  made  to  the  full  council  by  the  com- 
mittees. The  council  thus  meets  very  frequently,  and 
a  large  amount  of  labor  is  entailed  upon  the  chair- 
men of  committees. 

The  French  system  is  quite  different.     The  elected 
municipal  council   designate  the  mayor  from  their 

Resume  of    own  number,  and  also  appoint  from  their  own  body 

the  French  /.   ,  i  -,  -, 

system.  a  group  or  their  most  experienced  members  to  serve 
as  his  "  adjuncts,"  and  to  form  with  him  a  corps  ex- 
ecutif.  The  mayor,  in  turn,  assigns  to  each  of  these 
adjuncts  the  supervision  of  a  department  of  the  mu- 
nicipal service.  A  number  of  ordinary  members  of  the 
council  are  then  grouped  around  each  such  chairman, 
as  his  consulting  committee,  but  the  mayor  is  the 
controlling  spirit  in  the  total  executive  administra- 
tion. Under  him  and  his  executive  corps  the  expert 
civil  service  is  organized ;  and  while  the  full  council 
holds  comparatively  few  stated  meetings  in  the  year, 
the  executive  corps  is  in  very  frequent  session,  and 
the  departmental  business  is  thus  kept  in  harmonious 
relationship. 

Now  the  German  magistratsrath  is  the  glorification 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


317 


of  the  expert  chiefs  of  departments  that  one  finds  in 
the  English  system.  It  may  be  regarded  as  a  fusing 
into  one  supreme  executive  group  of  these  professional 
and  salaried  experts  and  the  level-headed  old  chair- 
men of  council  committees.  This  statement  will  be 
the  better  understood  when  the  structure  of  the  magis- 
tratsrath  is  still  further  analyzed.  The  Berlin  magis- 
tracy is  composed  of  thirty-four  members,  including 
the  chief  burgomaster  (oberburgermeister)  and  his  sub- 
stitute and  next  in  authority,  the  second  burgomaster. 
Of  this  body,  seventeen  are  salaried  and  are  appointed 
for  twelve-year  terms,  and  seventeen  are  unpaid,  and 
are  chosen  for  six-year  terms.  The  salaried  men,  in- 
cluding the  mayor  and  deputy-mayor,  are  selected  for 
their  expert  qualifications  exactly  as  a  board  of  rail- 
way directors  would  make  up  its  staff  of  general  offi- 
cers. They  come  from  the  civil  service  of  other  Ger- 
man cities,  where  they  have  made  a  record,  or  from 
the  departments  of  the  royal  Prussian  service,  from 
which  the  higher  salaries  paid  by  the  city  tempt  the 
best  and  most  ambitious  men.  The  paid  element  in 
the  magistracy  includes  legal  officers,  the  city  trea- 
surer, architects,  civil  engineers,  school  administrators, 
and  other  experts.  It  is  perfectly  understood  that 
these  men,  including  the  mayor,  will  be  reappointed 
at  the  end  of  their  terms  ;  and  their  tenure  is  practi- 
cally for  life,  unless  they  forfeit  their  positions  by  their 
own  misconduct.  The  seventeen  unpaid  magistrates 
may  be  said  to  represent  the  highest  development  of 
non-professional  experience  and  skill  in  municipal  af- 
fairs. They  have  some  resemblance  to  the  aldermanic 
element  in  the  English  councils,  or  to  the  chairmen 
of  English  council  committees.  They  have  in  most 
cases  served  efficiently  as  members  of  the  elected  mu- 
nicipal council,  and  are  citizens  with  sufficient  leisure 
and  means  to  devote  their  time  to  the  service  of  the 


CHAP.  V. 


The  German 
executive. 


Analysis  of 

Berlin 
magistracy. 


Sources 
whence 
drawn. 


Permanency 
of  tenure. 


The  unpaid 
members. 


318  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  v.     city,  from  the  motive  of  public  spirit  mingled  with 
that  of  satisfaction  in  the  honor  of  high  position.  For 
these  posts  are  held  in  the  highest  esteem;  and  the 
men  appointed  to  them  are  often  the  equals  of  their 
salaried  associates  in  administrative  or  even  in  scien- 
tific and  technical  qualifications.   These  unpaid  places 
Position  and  are  a^so  Practically  permanent,  the  incumbents  being 
duties.      usually  reappointed,  term  after  term.     Sometimes  va- 
cancies in  the  salaried  places  are  filled  by  the  transfer 
of  men  from  the  unsalaried  element  of  the  magistracy. 
Naturally  the  most  confining  and  arduous  duties  of 
administration  are  usually  assigned  to  the  paid  magis- 
trates, while  the  unpaid  men  serve  in  capacities  more 
advisory  than  severely  executive;  yet  it  often  hap- 
pens that  the  unpaid  members  assume  full  charge  of 
very  important  departments  of  the  public  service.    It 
is  important  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  distinguished 
Prefasaeisto°r  citizens  appointed  as  unpaid  magistrates  must  serve 
serve.      for  aj.  jeast  haif  their  six-year  term,  or  else  suffer  se- 
rious pains,  penalties,  and  disabilities. 

The  mayor  or  head  of  the  municipality  —  in  some 

cities  called  the  oberbiirgermeister  and  in  some  simply 

the  biirgermeister  —  is  the  general  manager  of  the 

tersand      whole  mechanism  of  administration,  and  usually  the 

their  func-  ....  .    . 

tions.       guiding  spirit  as  well  in  the  economic  policies  of 
the  municipality.   He  may  feel  that  success  in  the  man- 
agement of  a  smaller  city  will  perhaps  be  rewarded 
by  the  prize  of  the  mayoralty  of  a  greater  one.    Thus 
A  case  of  ^e  ^r'  Forckenbeck,  mayor  of  Berlin,  had  made 

promotion,  his  reputation  as  mayor  of  Breslau,  and  was  called  to 
fill  a  vacancy  in  the  same  position  at  the  capital.  On 
his  death  in  1892,  the  very  successful  mayor  of  Dan- 
tzic  was  prominently  mentioned  for  the  vacant  post ; 
but  Dr.  Zelle  of  the  Berlin  magistracy  was  promoted. 
Many  cities  appoint  their  mayors  for  life,  and  some 
make  a  trial  appointment  for  a  term  of  years  and  then 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK  319 

grant  a  life  lease.     Thus  the  mayors  of  Munich,  Leip-     CHAP.  v. 

sic,  Dresden,  Hanover,  Stuttgart,  Chemnitz,  and  va-  Life  appoint- 
ments. 
rious  smaller  cities,  are  life  incumbents ;  while  those 

of  Berlin,  Breslau,  Cologne,  Magdeburg,  Frankfort, 

„..     .       .  T...        '  „  &  ",,  Elsewhere 

Konigsberg,  Dusseldorf,  and  numerous  other  places,  tweiveyears. 
are  appointed  for  twelve-year  terms.  Strassburg, 
Metz,  and  the  Alsace-Lorraine  towns,  on  the  other 
hand,  grant  only  five-year  terms,  following  French 
rather  than  German  modes  of  city  organization,  and 
keeping  the  French  system  of  1870. 

The  tenure  of  the  paid  magistrates  in  general  fol- 
lows that  of  the  mayors,  and  the  cities  which  give 
life  appointments  to  the  chief  of  the  municipality     Tenure  of 
commonly  give  them  also  to  the  expert  professional    patratesf s" 
element  among  his  associates,  while  limiting  the  un- 
paid magistrates  to  terms  corresponding  with  those 
of  the  popularly  elected  councilors.     Duties  are  so 
well  distributed  among  the  magistrates  that  there 
results  the  highest  type  of  executive  efficiency,  and     of  teaks.0" 
the  least  possible  friction  or  waste  of  energy.     New 
departments  of  administration  may  either  be  assigned 
to  the  portfolios  of  existing  magistrates,  or  may  be 
provided  for  by  the  appointment  of  additional  mem- 
bers.    Thus  the  magistratsrath  is  sufficiently  flexible 
to  respond  to  the  changing  circumstances  of  a  city, 
and  the  presence  of  its  unsalaried  citizen  members 
keeps  it  always  sufficiently  in  touch  with  the  spirit 
of  the  community.     Magistrates  and  councilors  serve 
together  on  standing  committees.     It  should  further    Magistrates 
be  said  that  in  the  details  of  administration  the  mag-  ore  serve  t<> 
istrates  have  the  cooperation  in  various  ways,   to  committees. 
which  further  allusion  will  be  made,  of  numerous 
unofficial  citizens  serving  in  a  voluntary  or  honorary 
capacity  on  countless  sub-committees. 

Nearly  all  the  cities  in  G-ermany,  great  and  small, 
maintain  the  plan  of  a  magisterial  council  composed 


320 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  V. 


Paid  and  un- 
paid magis- 
trates in  va- 
rious cities. 


The  Stutt- 
gart plan. 


Why  salaries 
are  small. 


The  pay  of 
mayors. 


Magistrates' 

salaries. 


of  paid  and  unpaid  members.  In  Dresden  14  are  paid 
and  18  are  unpaid.  The  14  have  been  very  largely 
drawn  from  the  service  of  other  and  smaller  cities, 
while  the  18  have  been  promoted  to  the  magistracy 
after  valuable  service  in  the  elected  council.  Leipsic 
has  12  paid  and  15  unpaid  magistrates,  Munich  16 
and  20  respectively,  Breslau  11  and  13,  Frankfort  9 
and  8,  Hanover  8  and  9,  Nuremberg  9  and  17,  Chem- 
nitz 9  and  16.  In  many  of  the  smaller  cities  the  un- 
paid members  predominate  largely.  Stuttgart  pays 
its  mayor  alone,  and  appoints  all  its  other  magistrates 
from  its  own  public- spirited  citizens,  who  give  their 
services  freely.  But  it  is  a  marked  exception  to  the 
rule,  its  magistrates  having  in  fact  the  character  of 
the  French  "  adjuncts." 

Civil-service  salaries  in  general  are  very  small  in 
Germany,  for  the  reasons  that  positions  are  perma- 
nent, pensions  are  given  to  retiring  officials,  and  such 
posts  are  considered  socially  desirable  and  are  much 
sought  after.  Comparatively,  therefore,  the  pay  of 
burgomasters  and  magistrates  is  considered  very 
large  by  the  German  official  class.  The  mayor  of 
Berlin  receives  30,000  marks  ($7500),  and  the  salaries 
of  other  German  mayors  range  from  that  figure  down 
to  about  10,000  marks  ($2500).  The  deputy-burgo- 
master has  the  next  highest  salary  — 18,000  marks  in 
Berlin,  and  from  6000  to  12,000  in  other  cities.  The 
average  pay  of  the  Berlin  magistrates  is  about  12,500 
marks,  while,  if  one  should  average  a  hundred  or 
more  German  towns,  great  and  small,  the  current 
yearly  pay  of  this  class  of  expert  officials  would  be 
found  to  be  about  6000  marks  ($1500).  Such  remuner- 
ation is  tempting  enough  to  give  the  cities  an  abun- 
dant supply  of  trained  talent  from  the  universities 
and  technical  schools,  and  from  the  various  lines  of 
State  service.  Under  the  mayor  and  magistrates  are 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FRAMEWORK 


321 


CHAP.  V. 


Police 
authority. 


Berlin 
watchmen. 


the  numerous  officials,  of  all  grades  and  ranks,  who 
constitute  the  membership  of  the  municipal  civil  ser- 
vice, and  who  are  trained  men  in  their  respective 
departments. 

The  police  authority  in  Germany  is  retained  as  a 
function  of  the  State,  and  is  usually  exercised  under 
the  supervision  of  administrative  officers  who  repre- 
sent the  higher  authority  rather  than  the  purely  local 
interests.  The  cost  of  the  police  in  large  cities  is  as 
a  rule  borne  chiefly  by  the  State,  although  in  some 
places  it  is  shared  by  the  municipalities.  In  Berlin 
the  city  authorities  maintain  a  force  of  night  watch- 
men ;  but  the  general  police  organization  belongs  to 
the  royal  Prussian  service.  Opinion  in  Germany  is 
divided  upon  the  question  whether  the  ordinary  po- 
lice administration  should  be  made  over  to  the  mu- 
nicipal governments  or  separately  maintained  by  the 
State.  Many  active  friends  of  the  municipal  regime 
prefer  that  the  police  system  should  remain  on  a  quasi-  of  fun 
military  footing,  under  control  of  the  political  power. 
In  practice  it  appears  an  easy  matter  for  the  munici- 
pal and  police  authorities  to  keep  a  good  understand- 
ing and  work  together  harmoniously.  It  is  the  German 
fashion  to  exercise  an  extremely  minute  police  over- 
sight. The  entire  population  is  enrolled  upon  the 
police  registers,  and  the  comings  and  goings  are  ob- 
served and  recorded.  In  many  German  cities  the  an- 
nual directories  are  published  and  sold  by  the  police  police 
authorities,  their  central  office  necessarily  possessing  directories, 
all  the  names  and  facts  required  for  the  compilation 
of  a  directory.  Private  guests  from  outside  the  city, 
as  well  as  hotel  arrivals,  must  be  reported  at  police 
headquarters,  with  an  amount  of  information  of  a 
strictly  personal  nature  that  American  or  English 
travelers  always  find  amusing. 

Such,  then,  is  the  framework  and  structure  of  the 
21 


322 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Officialism 

in  German 

cities. 


CHAP.  v.  German  municipality.  It  meets  the  demands  made 
upon  it.  The  German  mind  has  a  clear  conception 
of  the  municipality  as  an  organization  for  business 
and  social  ends,  and  of  the  municipal  government  as 
a  mechanism  for  the  accomplishment  of  those  ends. 
"  Officialism,"  so-called,  expert  and  highly  organized, 
results  inevitably.  I  am  not  advocating  the  introduc- 
tion of  the  German  type  of  officialism  into  our 
American  city  life.  And,  indeed,  I  have  no  desire  in 
these  chapters  to  hold  any  argument  with  those  who 
do  not  believe  in  the  development,  for  America,  of  a 
permanent,  skilled,  non-political  body  of  city  officials. 
My  present  object  is  to  make  comparison  easier.  For 
my  own  part,  I  see  no  possible  reason  why,  having 
city  business  to  do,  we  should  be  unwilling  to  have 
it  performed  in  as  business-like  a  manner  as  we 
should  demand  in  the  conduct  of  a  private  enter- 
prise. Nor  do  I  see  how  an  acceptance  of  the  idea 
that  the  municipal  corporation  exists  for  the  conduct 
of  a  series  of  business  and  social  enterprises  can 
comport  with  the  rejection  of  the  idea  of  a  perma- 
nent, expert  body  of  administrators, —  that  is  to  say, 
a  somewhat  highly  developed  officialism.  However, 
Believed  by  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  in  Germany  the  perfunc- 
tory tendencies  of  officialism  are  much  diminished  by 
the  plan  of  enlisting  the  services  of  thousands  of  non- 
official  citizens  in  the  oversight  of  the  schools,  the  dis- 
tribution of  charitable  relief,  and  other  municipal  un- 
dertakings, together  with  the  custom  of  placing  the 
ablest  and  wisest  citizens  in  the  town  council  or  in 
the  magistracy. 


ordinary 
citizens. 


CHAPTER  VI 
MUNICIPAL  FUNCTIONS  IN  GERMANY 

rilHE  practical  management  of  German  cities  pro- 
J_    ceeds  in  harmony  with  the  German  conception 
of  the  municipality  as  a  social  organism.     Such  a  con- 
ception has  metaphysical  aspects;  but  with  theories 

,,.,-,.  ,  ii«         The  German 

and  philosophies  we  need  not  concern  ourselves  tor  conception, 
present  purposes.  It  is  enough  for  us  to  understand 
that  in  Germany  the  community,  organized  centrally 
and  officially,  is  a  far  more  positive  factor  in  the  life 
of  the  family  or  the  individual  than  in  America.  The 
German  municipal  government  is  not  a  thing  apart, 
but  is  vitally  identified  with  every  concern  of  the 
municipality  ;  and  the  municipality  is  the  aggregation 
of  human  beings  and  human  interests  included  within 
the  territorial  boundaries  that  fix  the  community's 
area  and  jurisdiction.  There  are,  in  the  German  con- 
ception of  city  government,  no  limits  whatever  to  the  NO  limits  to 

-r     .       ,  .  „  .    .         municipal 

municipal  functions.    It  is  the  business  of  the  munici-    functions, 
pality  to  promote  in  every  feasible  way  its  own  wel- 
fare and  the  welfare  of  its  citizens.    This  conception 
must  be  carefully  distinguished  from  socialism,  with 
which  it  is  not  necessarily  in  harmony. 

A  concrete  illustration  will  perhaps  help  to  make 
the  difference  clear.  In  1893  the  municipal  govern- 
ment of  Stuttgart  decided  that  the  city  should  con-  An  mustra- 

i  i      A    •     T    i  L-    "  ^  A  tion  from 

struct,  own,  and  operate  electric-lighting  works.    An    Stuttgart. 
investigating  committee  had  reported  in  favor  of  giv- 

323 


324 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Not  a 

question  of 
socialism. 


Why  Stutt- 
gart muni- 
cipalized 
electricity. 


Municipal 

gas  had  been 

decided 

upon. 


ing  a  franchise  for  a  term  of  years  to  a  private  com- 
pany. The  question  was  decided  adversely  to  the 
committee's  report  by  a  vote  of  13  to  12  in  the  coun- 
cil of  magistrates.  It  was  purely  a  question  of  busi- 
ness judgment.  Socialism  would  have  demanded 
municipal  ownership  and  operation  because  socialism 
is  at  war  with  private  capital.  But  the  Stuttgart 
council  was  dealing  with  a  question  of  practical 
finance,  on  behalf  of  the  community.  Half  of  the 
council  firmly  held  that  for  ten  years  or  more,  in  the 
developing  and  experimental  stages  of  electricity  in 
Stuttgart, —  the  new  illuminant  not  being  as  yet  an 
article  of  common  necessity  and  demand, —  it  would 
be  a  better  business  policy  to  allow  a  private  company 
to  establish  the  lighting  plant,  the  city  carefully  re- 
serving the  right,  after  a  short  period,  to  supersede 
the  private  company  on  reasonable  terms  of  purchase. 
Twelve  men  out  of  twenty-five  adhered  to  this  view 
to  the  end.  If  the  question  had  presented  itself  sin- 
gly, on  its  sole  merits,  a  decisive  majority  would  have 
favored  the  plan  of  private  ownership. 

But  let  me  explain  the  circumstances  which  secured 
the  contrary  decision.  Stuttgart  was  one  of  the  very 
few  German  cities  which  had  not  made  the  manu- 
facture and  sale  of  gas  a  municipal  monopoly.  In  the 
early  future,  however,  as  was  fully  agreed,  the  munici- 
pal council  was  to  buy  out  the  existing  gas  company 
and  go  into  the  business.  Gas  is  an  article  of  common 
necessity ;  it  is  in  its  nature  an  article  that  is  subject 
to  monopoly  control ;  for  street  purposes  the  munici- 
pality was  already  a  very  large  consumer ;  the  gas  busi- 
ness is  beyond  the  experimental  stages ;  in  Germany 
it  has  been  demonstrably  profitable  for  cities  to  make 
the  gas-supply  a  municipal  monopoly.  Stuttgart, 
therefore,  had  already  decided  to  "  municipalize  "  the 
gas-works  at  the  end  of  the  franchise  soon  to  expire. 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  325 

But  to  charter  a  private  company  to  control  electric-  CHAP.  vi. 
lighting  just  as  the  city  was  about  to  assume  gas- 
lighting  as  a  public  monopoly,  might  involve  rivalries 
that  would  be  embarrassing  and  vexatious.  The  fact 
of  having  the  gas  monopoly  would  make  it  more 
likely  that  the  city  could  manage  electrical  works  in 
conjunction  without  much  financial  risk  or  danger. 
Obviously,  there  was  considerable  force  in  this  argu- 
ment. And  there  was  still  another  consideration  in 
favor  of  a  municipal  electrical  monopoly.  The  Street 
Railway  Company  of  Stuttgart  had  for  some  time 
desired  permission  to  change  its  motive-power  from 
horses  to  electricity,  with  the  overhead-trolley  system. 
Stuttgart  is  not  a  large  city,  and  the  objection  to  the 
trolley  on  the  score  of  danger  was  not  very  well 
founded.  The  company  was  willing  to  become  a  cus- 
tomer of  the  municipal  electric  power  and  lighting  tomerready. 
plant,  at  a  fair  price  that  was  agreed  upon,  for  all 
the  electricity  it  should  need;  and  the  assurance  of 
this  large  and  regular  patronage  would  lessen  the 
speculative  risk  involved  in  entering  upon  the  busi- 
ness of  electrical  supply  as  a  municipal  undertaking. 
So  much  for  the  facts ;  a  word  as  to  their  bearing 
upon  the  German  conception  of  municipal  functions. 
So  far  as  I  am  aware,  the  theories  of  socialism  did  not 
materially  influence  either  group  in  the  Stuttgart  coun- 
cil. The  inquirer  who  has  been  led  to  suppose  that  he 
will  find  in  the  German  cities  a  consistent,  highly-de. 
veloped  collectivism,  carried  into  practice  in  the  spirit 
of  opposition  to  private  initiative,  will  hardly  be  able  spirit  of 
to  find  all  that  he  expected.  He  will  certainly  find  a  in°  Germany1. 
great  many  interesting  and  successful  instances  of 
municipal  activity  in  fields  that  are  abandoned  al- 
most wholly  to  private  enterprise  in  our  American 
cities.  But  he  would  scarcely  be  able  to  report  that 

he  found  these  things  done  on  doctrinaire  grounds. 

21* 


326 

CHAP.  vi.  The  municipality  holds  itself  deeply  and  supremely 
responsible  for  its  own  welfare.  Half  of  the  Stutt- 
gart council  thought  that  the  welfare  of  the  commu- 
nity, considered  as  an  organic  whole,  would  be  better 
and  more  economically  served,  so  far  as  the  introduc- 
tion of  applied  electricity  is  concerned,  if  a  private 
company  were  authorized  to  undertake  the  business, 
under  municipal  regulation  and  oversight.  Is  it  not 
plain  that  with  this  spirit  and  with  this  conception  of 
the  municipal  responsibility  it  would  not  have  mat- 

NotMng     tered  seriously  which  way  the  question  was  decided  ? 

vital  in  the     -.-.-  .,  -in 

issue.  No  councilors  were  accused  of  a  corrupt  or  improper 
zeal  for  any  private  company  that  was  seeking  a  fran- 
chise. If  a  franchise  had  been  granted,  it  would  have 
been  given  on  strict  business  principles.  The  munici- 
Municipai  pality  would  have  dominated  the  question  of  electri- 
°eithTrgeasen  cal  supply,  in  either  case.  The  citizens  would  not 
have  been  thrown  upon  the  mercy  of  a  private  com- 
pany exercising  a  monopoly  control ;  for  the  munici- 
pality itself,  acting  steadily  and  constantly  through 
its  official  organs,  would  have  stood  between  the  citi- 
zens and  the  supply  company,  regulating  and  control- 
ling in  the  common  interest. 

Stuttgart  has  been  rather  a  laggard  than  a  pioneer 
among  German  cities  in  the  matter  of  productive  mu- 
nicipal enterprises,  and  it  is  by  mere  chance  that  I 
have  adduced  it  for  purposes  of  illustration.  We 
may,  however,  find  it  worth  while  to  dwell  a  moment 
longer  at  the  pleasant  capital  of  Wiirtemberg.  To 
assume  the  gas-supply,  and  to  enter  upon  the  monop- 
oly control  of  electric  light  and  power,  will  mark  a 
long  step  in  the  local  development  of  the  municipal 
business  functions.  In  due  course,  the  Street  Rail- 
way Company's  franchise  will  expire.  Stuttgart's 
Future  municipal  plant  will  have  furnished  the  supply  of  elec- 
trical  power,  and  passenger  transit  in  German  cities 


THE  GERMAJST  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


327 


will  have  attained  an  importance  far  greater  than  it 
now  possesses.  We  shall  then  see  the  Stuttgart 
council  investigating  with  patient  care  and  scientific 
skill  the  experience  of  other  cities  in  the  management 
of  street-railways;  and  we  need  not  be  surprised  if 
the  decision  should  be  in  favor  of  municipal  owner- 
ship and  direct  operation.  This  further  step  would 
only  be  taken  after  the  most  mature  preparation,  and 
upon  the  full  assurance  that  it  would  be  a  thrifty, 
solid  business  investment,  and  that  the  welfare  of  the 
municipal  organism  would  be  promoted.  Next,  may 
we  not  expect  to  see  something  like  a  municipal  mo- 
nopoly of  the  fuel-supply?  With  the  progress  of 
electricity  as  an  illuminant,  gas  is  likely  to  be  used 
more  and  more  as  a  fuel.  The  city  will  already  be 
supplying  a  certain  number  of  gas-motors  and  gas- 
stoves  ;  and  the  very  logic  of  its  position,  as  monopo- 
list in  the  domain  of  gas  and  electricity,  will  surely  — 
with  the  inevitable  triumph  everywhere  of  the  idea  of 
an  urban  distribution  of  heat  or  fuel,  or  both,  from 
central  reservoirs  —  lead  the  conservative  Stuttgart 
municipality  into  the  practical  business  of  supplying 
another  common  necessity. 

If  any  one  chooses  to  call  this  sort  of  thing  a  plunge 
into  socialism,  it  would  probably  be  idle  and  profitless 
to  quarrel  with  his  use  of  a  much  abused  word.  The 
Germans  would  consider  it  nothing  else  than  a  thrifty 
and  progressive  municipal  housekeeping.  It  involves 
no  new  principles;  for  everything  was  already  in- 
volved, potentially,  in  the  German  conception  of  the 
municipality's  full  and  unlimited  responsibility  for 
the  general  welfare  of  the  community.  If  German 
experience  showed  that  the  various  common  services 
that  we  call  natural  monopolies  of  supply  could  be 
conducted  by  private  persons  in  a  manner  more  ad- 
vantageous to  the  community,  there  would  soon  be 


CHAP.  VI. 


A  municipal 
fuel-supply. 


This  does 
not  mean 
socialism. 


A  mere 
question  of 

business 
expediency. 


328 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Stuttgart's 
water. 


Disposal  of 
waste. 


Management 

of  cleansing 

services. 


Cemeteries. 


Municipal 
forestry. 


an  end  of  municipal  management  ;  but  the  municipal 
responsibility  would  be  undiminished,  and  the  muni- 
cipality would  remain  what  it  now  is,  —  a  great,  posi- 
tive, dominating  factor  in  the  life  of  the  citizens,  —  an 
organic  entity.  Conservative  Stuttgart  a  good  while 
ago  assumed  the  ownership  and  control  of  the  water- 
supply,  and  conducts  the  business  both  for  the  health 
of  the  people  and  also  for  substantial  profits  to  lessen 
the  direct  taxes.  It  also  manages  quite  elaborately 
as  a  municipal  monopoly  the  removal  of  night-soil 
and  domestic  refuse,  turning  the  nitrogenous  waste 
into  a  fertilizer  ;  and  this  undertaking  is  not  only  self- 
supporting,  but  productive  of  an  attractive  net  in- 
come. Stuttgart  has  not  found  out  how  to  make 
street-sweeping  and  garbage-disposal  a  source  of  clear 
profit,  but  it  manages  fairly  well  to  secure  public  and 
domestic  cleanliness  ;  and  by  keen  business  manage- 
ment and  a  perfect  readiness  to  turn  much  or  all 
of  the  work  over  to  private  contractors  when  that 
method  appears  most  economical,  the  best  results  are 
attained  at  the  least  cost  to  the  community.  The 
Stuttgart  municipal  cemeteries  are  conducted  at  a 
moderate  net  profit.  In  a  limited  sense,  the  very 
parks  are  a  source  of  income.  That  is  to  say,  the 
whole  acreage  of  municipal  pleasure-grounds,  hospi- 
tal-grounds, school-grounds,  and  other  areas  contain- 
ing trees,  is  for  certain  purposes  put  under  control 
of  a  forestry  department  of  the  city  government  ;  and 
this  department,  by  a  judicious  and  non-destructive 
harvesting  of  the  timber  resources  of  the  municipal 
domain,  is  able  to  keep  up  paths  and  lawns,  to  pay  all 
its  own  salaries  and  expenses,  and  to  turn  over  as  net 
profits  fifty  per  cent,  of  the  gross  revenue  from  the 
sale  of  timber  and  firewood.  I  have  mentioned  these 
matters  as  minor  instances  of  the  characteristic  thrift 
of  a  German  city  government.  I  have  never  heard 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  329 

Stuttgart  mentioned  as  a  model ;  and  it  would  be    CHAP.  vi. 
easier  to  array  such  concrete  illustrations  from  the 
housekeeping  of  various  other  cities. 

But  a  deep  responsibility  for  the  welfare  of  the 
municipal  household  means  something  very  different  ofmuni- 
from  the  successful  conduct  of  these  specific  business  eipslbmty?n" 
undertakings.  Their  assumption,  or  their  relegation 
to  private  hands,  involves  little  more  than  a  decision 
from  time  to  time  as  to  what  is  opportune  and  what 
is  inopportune.  It  is  conceivable  that  the  G-erman 
city  might  do  none  of  these  things,  and  that  the 
American  city  might  plunge  into  them  all,  and  yet 
that  the  German  city  should  remain  a  far  more  posi- 
tive and  essential  factor  in  the  life  of  its  citizens. 
For  the  German  city  would  hold  fast  to  its  concep- 
tion of  the  municipal  household,  and  would  yield 
nothing  of  its  solicitous  oversight  and  its  inclusive 
responsibility.  The  German  city  holds  itself  respon- 
sible for  the  education  of  all;  for  the  provision  of 
amusement  and  the  means  of  recreation;  for  the 
adaptation  of  the  training  of  the  young  to  the  neces- 
sities  of  gaining  a  livelihood  ;  for  the  health  of  fami- 
lies ;  for  the  moral  interests  of  all ;  for  the  civilizing 
of  the  people ;  for  the  promotion  of  individual  thrift ; 
for  protection  from  various  misfortunes ;  for  the  de- 
velopment of  advantages  and  opportunities  in  order 
to  promote  the  industrial  and  commercial  well-being, 
and  incidentally  for  the  supply  of  common  services 
and  the  introduction  of  conveniences. 

Broadly  but  not  sharply  distinguished,  the  Ger- 
man cities  recognize  two  kinds  of  functions:  those 
that  can  be  made  largely  self-supporting  or  even  pro- 
ductive of  net  revenue,  and  those  that  cannot  possibly  Of  functions. 
be  so  considered.  The  latter  are  the  more  important ; 
and  in  this  class  the  three  most  important  are  the 
education  of  the  children,  the  protection  of  the  public 


330 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Municipal 
life  as  a 
science. 


Principles 

of  municipal 

finance. 


Support  of 
poverty. 


Education ; 

its  cost  and 

worth. 


health,  and  the  care  of  the  poor  and  unfortunate. 
To  accomplish  these  and  other  kindred  ends,  munici- 
pal life  in  Germany  has  been  reduced  to  a  science. 
German  population-masses  are  more  cohesive  than 
Anglo-Saxon  masses,  and  the  individual  is  more  de- 
pendent upon  his  neighbors  and  upon  the  community 
to  which  he  belongs.  The  voluntary  principle  would 
not  work  so  well  in  Germany  as  in  England  or  Amer- 
ica. But  we  must  remember  that  the  municipal  in- 
tervention in  Germany  is  not  merely  mechanical. 
Principles  exist  which  give  heart  and  soul  to  the  sys- 
tem. The  voluntary  agencies  have  been  absorbed  in 
the  municipal,  or  affiliated  with  them,  without  crush- 
ing out  the  sense  of  human  brotherhood  and  mutual 
responsibility  upon  which,  after  all,  must  rest  the 
well-being  of  any  community. 

Municipal  financiering  in  Germany  is  a  high  art. 
It  unites  thrift  and  minute  economy  with  broad  lib- 
erality. Its  most  obvious  feature  is  to  make  each 
service  or  department  self-sustaining  or  productive 
so  far  as  possible,  and  to  make  the  social  benefits  of 
the  non-productive  departments  so  clear  as  to  admit 
of  no  doubt.  Where  charity  has  become  so  com- 
pletely municipalized,  the  duty  of  caring  for  the 
aged  and  the  submerged  poor  involves  a  heavy  draft 
upon  current  revenues ;  but  ultimately  German  fi- 
nance will  have  perfected  systems  of  compulsory  in- 
surance that  will  enable  the  State  and  municipality 
to  accumulate  social  salvage  funds  out  of  which  old 
age  and  distress  can  for  the  most  part  be  sustained. 
Education  will  remain  a  heavy  burden ;  but  the  Ger- 
man community  no  longer  needs  to  be  reminded  that 
thorough  and  specialized  education  tells  so  promptly 
upon  the  industrial  productivity  and  commercial  pros- 
perity of  a  city  or  a  province  that  it  is  cheap  at  any 
cost.  In  like  manner  Germany's  municipal  statisti- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


331 


cians  and  hygienic  experts  have  come  to  the  aid  of 
the  financiers  with  facts  and  conclusions  so  irresisti- 
ble, that  the  people  are  ready  to  bear  burdens  of  taxa- 
tion for  the  boon  of  an  exemption  from  febrile  dis- 
eases and  a  reduction  by  one  half  of  infant  mortality. 
The  money  that  is  spent  in  the  interest  of  the  common 
health  is  applied  with  such  amplitude  of  scientific 
knowledge, —  and  such  care  that  every  dollar  shall 
count  for  an  end  that  is  in  the  long  run  commercially 
profitable  as  well  as  socially  salutary, —  that  the  in- 
vestment is  plainly  seen  to  justify  the  borrowing  of 
the  money  and  the  pledging  of  the  municipal  credit. 
Meanwhile,  the  courage  of  the  community  is  sus- 
tained, under  the  heavy  ordeal  of  taxation,  by  the 
success  of  the  municipal  government  in  managing 
the  departments  that  are  productive  in  their  nature. 
Even  though  these  departments  yield  only  a  small 
fraction  of  the  total  revenue  necessary  to  meet  the 
expenditures  of  a  municipality  that  is  responsible  for 
the  welfare  of  all  its  people,  they  give  an  air  of  thrift 
to  its  financiering,  and  encourage  an  optimism  that 
sees  in  the  future  monopoly-rentals  of  various  fran- 
chises and  supply-services  a  largely  increased  propor- 
tion of  the  public  revenue. 

It  is  not  strange  that  the  American  observer  should 
at  first  be  most  impressed  by  the  splendid  efficiency 
of  German  city  governments  in  the  prosecution  of 
public  works  and  enterprises.  This  is  largely  due,  of 
course,  to  the  superb  and  continuous  organization  of 
the  executive  administration.  The  burgomaster  is 
actually  or  virtually  a  life  incumbent,  and  his  magi- 
sterial associates  who  conduct  the  various  depart- 
ments either  hold  their  places  by  life  tenure  or  else 
upon  terms  practically  as  permanent.  The  city  coun- 
cil, representing  the  people's  will,  is  renewed  by  in- 


CHAP.  VI. 

The  financial 
argument 
for  sanitary 

expenditure. 


Optimism 
arising  from 
good  man- 
agement of 
earning  de- 
partments. 


Public 
works. 


332 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Execution 
of  far-reach- 
ing plans. 


Deliberate 
methods. 


Berlin's 
paving,  and 
New  York's. 


Business 
versus 
politics. 


stalments.  The  terms  are  long,  and  reelections  are 
so  usual  that  the  personnel  of  the  body  is  transformed 
very  slowly,  and  nothing  like  an  abrupt  or  capricious 
change  of  policy  is  ever  probable.  Consequently  it 
is  possible  to  make  long  plans,  to  proceed  without 
haste,  to  distribute  burdens  through  periods  of  years, 
to  consult  minute  economies,  and  to  make  an  even, 
symmetrical  progress  that  has  far  more  of  tangible 
achievement  to  show  for  every  half-decade  than  could 
be  possible  under  our  spasmodic  American  methods. 
A  German  city,  let  us  say,  decides  to  have  well-paved 
streets,  and  to  modernize  its  whole  thoroughfare-sys- 
tem. It  proceeds  to  learn  everything  that  can  possi- 
bly be  known  about  street-making.  The  effect  of  its 
immediate  climatic  conditions  upon  different  kinds 
of  materials  is  studied  theoretically  and  experimen- 
tally. The  municipal  department  of  public  works 
does  not  move  a  step  until  every  detail  of  the  prob- 
lem from  the  engineering  and  from  the  financiering 
standpoint  has  been  thoroughly  worked  out. 

On  this  fashion  the  magnificent  public  works  of  Ber- 
lin have  proceeded.  The  result  is  that  in  the  period 
from  1870  to  1890,  it  may  be  asserted,  $100,000  ac- 
complished more  for  the  permanent  making  of  good 
streets  in  that  city  than  $1,000,000  in  New  York. 
Vastly  more  money  had  been  expended  on  the  streets 
of  New  York  than  on  those  of  Berlin  in  these  twenty 
years.  Yet  Berlin  was  beautifully  paved,  while  New 
York,  except  for  a  few  favored  streets,  was  almost  as 
impassable  as  Constantinople  or  Damascus.  Since 
1890  New  York  streets  have  improved ;  but  the  con- 
trast in  1895  was  only  a  little  less  painful.  Nothing 
accounts  for  this  difference  except  the  superiority 
of  sound  business  methods  in  Germany  over  wasteful 
political  methods  in  America.  Throughout  all  Ger- 
many the  public-works  departments  of  the  towns  are 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


333 


busy  carrying  out  the  mandates  of  their  respective 
municipalities,  and  creating  on  permanent  lines  the 
material  attributes  of  the  well-ordered  modern  city. 
Nothing  is  hurried,  yet  nothing  seems  to  lag  when 
once  begun.  Street-systems  are  rectified;  new  sub- 
urbs are  judiciously  laid  out ;  here  a  new  water-sup- 
ply, introduced  from  high  sources,  employs  engineers, 
architects,  and  conduit-builders.  In  another  city 
new  sewers  are  in  progress,  on  a  plan  for  the  complete 
and  final  drainage  of  the  place.  River  frontages  are 
undergoing  magnificent  improvement,  for  purposes 
of  water  traffic.  Gas-works,  electric-plants,  market- 
houses,  public  abattoirs,  school  buildings,  epidemic 
hospitals,  bridges,  wharves,  subways,  or  whatever 
else  the  expanding  requirements  of  the  municipality 
may  ordain, —  all  are  in  course  of  construction  by  me- 
thods that  insure  the  highest  utility  and  greatest  per- 
manence. To  cite  illustrations  or  to  present  statistics 
would  introduce  an  almost  endless  task.  It  is  enough 
to  say  that  the  German  cities  have  accepted  the  idea 
that  their  appointments  must  conform  to  the  newly 
recognized  necessities  of  modern  life,  and  that  they 
are  steadily  supplying  these  appointments  with  mas- 
terly administrative  and  technical  ability,  and  with 
such  a  combination  of  close  economy  and  generous 
foresight  as  no  other  nation  has  ever  exhibited. 

Berlin's  new  era  of  municipal  progress  may  be 
said  to  date  from  1861.  In  that  year  it  annexed  con- 
siderable suburban  territory.  The  old  city  walls  were 
torn  down  to  give  free  communication  with  the  new 
quarters.  The  Emperor  William  came  to  the  Prus- 
sian throne  in  1861,  and  his  accession  marked  the  be- 
ginning of  a  liberal  policy  on  the  part  of  the  State 
toward  the  city  of  Berlin.  The  new  Eathhaus  (City 
Hall)  was  begun  in  that  year.  Prussia's  ad- 
vance among  European  powers  gave  Berlin  an  ambi- 


CHAP.  VI. 


An  era  of  im- 
provement 
in  German 
towns. 


Recognition 

of  modern 

needs. 


Berlin's  new 

impulse  in 

1861. 


334 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Effect  of 
campaigns. 


Reforming 
the  streets. 


Embanking 
the  Spree. 


An 

aggressive 
municipal 
program. 


tion  to  rival  Paris.  The  influence  of  the  Haussmann 
transformation  of  Parisian  streets  was  felt  in  the  Ger- 
man capital.  The  successive  wars  and  Prussian  vic- 
tories of  1864,  1866,  and  1870-71,  ending  with  the 
formation  of  the  German  Empire  and  the  designation 
of  Berlin  as  its  capital,  enormously  stimulated  the 
municipal  life.  A  policy  of  bold  initiative  was  en- 
tered upon.  Boulevards  were  constructed,  and  the 
new  suburbs  were  handsomely  laid  out.  The  royal 
government  had  always  controlled  the  inner  street- 
system, —  together  with  the  paving,  drainage,  the 
Spree  navigation,  and  the  bridges, — and  had  allowed  a 
private  company  to  furnish  the  water-supply.  A  pri- 
vate company  also  controlled  the  gas-supply.  Educa- 
tion was  largely  in  private  or  clerical  hands.  But 
the  awakened  municipality  acquired  from  the  general 
government  in  1874  the  control  of  the  streets,  and  set 
about  reforming  them.  It  entered  upon  projects  of 
widening  and  straightening  lines  of  main  thorough- 
fare, and  of  laying  good  pavements.  The  process  has 
gone  on  steadily  to  this  day,  with  magnificent  results. 
The  city  acquired  control  of  the  shallow  and  sluggish 
Spree,  embanked  it  with  massive  walls,  flanked  it  with 
broad  stone  quays,  dredged  it  for  heavy  traffic,  and 
replaced  its  old  wooden  bridges  with  modern  struc- 
tures of  stone  and  steel. 

In  1873  the  municipality  had  acquired  control  of 
the  water-supply,  and  had  at  once  proceeded  to  create 
a  new  and  improved  system.  It  also  determined  to 
abandon  the  growingly  dangerous  practice  of  drain- 
ing the  city  sewage  into  the  diminutive  Spree  ;  and  it 
entered  not  only  upon  a  marvelous  system  for  the 
disposal  of  sewage,  but  also  proceeded  in  the  interest 
of  the  public  health  to  create  a  great  series  of  sanitary 
institutions,  including  municipal  slaughter-houses 
and  market  halls,  hospitals  for  infections  diseases, 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  335 

unified  arrangements  for  public  and  private  cleans-  CHAP.  vi. 
ing,  and  systematic  inspection  of  food,  houses,  and 
all  conditions  affecting  the  public  health.  The  be- 
ginnings of  the  municipal  gas  manufacture  had  dated 
from  about  1870,  and  the  success  of  the  experiment 
had  led  to  very  great  enlargements  in  1875.  Mean- 
while, education  had  been  municipalized  with'  an 
energy  and  thoroughness  perhaps  unprecedented  any- 
where. Manufactures  and  railways  had  been  encour- 
aged, and  technical  and  practical  education  had  been  The  making 
so  arranged  as  to  promote  Berlin's  development  as  a  metropolis. 
center  of  industry.  Parks,  recreation-grounds,  and 
gymnastic  establishments  were  provided  for  the  peo- 
ple. Housing  was  at  length  brought  under  municipal 
regulations  of  a  very  strict  character,  in  the  interest 
of  the  workingmasses ;  and  an  excellent  and  comprehen- 
sive system  of  street-railways  was  devised, —  under  mu- 
nicipal inspiration,  though  under  private  management, 
— for  the  better  facilitation  of  local  transit  and  the  wider 
distribution  of  the  rapidly  growing  population.  Ber- 
lin is  about  four  times  as  large  as  it  was  in  1860 ;  and 
the  immense  influx  of  people,  chiefly  of  the  working 
classes,  has  been  received  and  accommodated  with  an 
ease  that  seems  nothing  short  of  magical. 

The  quantity  of  water  used  by  a  city  is  regarded 
by  British  sanitary  authorities  as,  in  a  rough  way,  a 
measure  of  its  relative  civilization.  An  abundant 
supply  of  pure  water,  thoroughly  distributed,  is  in- 
deed a  vital  consideration  for  any  city, —  too  vital  to  _ 

J          J  '  Berlin  a  wa- 

be  entrusted  to  private  business  control.  Berlin  has  ter  supply. 
abundant  reason  to  rejoice  in  the  past  twenty  years 
that  it  has  had  direct  management  of  its  water.  The 
quantity  has  had  to  be  constantly  increased,  and  the 
purity  of  the  supply  has  had  to  be  secured  by  filtra- 
tion, involving  elaborate  plants.  New  sources,  more 


336  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  vi.    and  more  remote  from  the  city,  have  had  to  be  found 
and  brought  into  the  system.     A  private  company 
could  never  have  been  induced  to  make  the  invest- 
ment required  for  a  sufficient  and  purified  supply ;  but 
The  financial  the  city  has  found  it  profitable,  considered  as  a  purelv 

point  of  *     .  f  7  •     j 

view.  commercial  undertaking.  The  works  supply  Berlin 
with  about  40,000,000  cubic  meters  per  annum,  of 
which  nearly  ten  per  cent,  is  used  free  of  cost  for 
various  public  purposes.  The  income  collected  from 
private  users  pays  all  expenses  of  operation,  and  after 
providing  for  interest  on  the  cost,  and  for  a  sinking- 
fund  to  redeem  the  debt  on  the  plant,  it  yields  a  sur- 
plus net  profit  each  year  of  about  2,500,000  marks. 
The  sanitary  authorities  at  Berlin  have  led  the  world 

The  sanitary  J 

jconsidera-  in  recent  inquiries  into  the  relation  of  water-supply 
to  public  health ;  and  the  character  of  the  service  ren- 
dered by  the  Berlin  water- works  is  constantly  improv- 
ing. Science  has  triumphed  notably  over  natural 
difficulties,  and  the  municipality  will  be  able,  in  de- 
veloping the  service,  to  keep  pace  with  the  rapidly 
increasing  demand.  The  Berlin  population  is  housed 
in  tenement-flats,  and  water  is  sold  by  meter  —  not  to 

Water  sold  J 

by  meter,  the  tenant,  but  to  the  landlord  of  the  building.  The 
system  prevents  waste  without  depriving  the  people 
of  an  amount  equal  to  all  their  necessities.  It  is  a 
method  that  has  been  worked  out  gradually  and  in- 
telligently, and  it  saves  the  city  a  great  deal  of  money. 
The  other  German  cities  are  adopting  it. 

When  the  Berlin  authorities  decided  to  establish  a 
metropolitan  water-supply,  they  also  determined  upon 
another  and  still  greater  undertaking.  They  per- 

Good  sewer-  ceived  that  the  modern  city  requires. —  as  the  corn- 
age  as  the 

complement   plement  of  a  good  system  of  pure  water  distributed 
ter  supply,     through  every  street  and  every  building, —  an  equally 
good  system  of  house  drainage  and  of  sewage  re- 
moval and  disposition.    The  modern  ideal  is  a  strong, 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


337 


pure  volume  of  water,  derived  from  sure  and  constant 
sources  that  are  beyond  danger  of  pollution,  forced 
by  ample  pressure  through  a  network  of  mains  and 
penetrating  every  abode, —  and  then,  being  contami- 
nated by  use  and  saturated  with  refuse  from  closets, 
kitchens,  and  street  drainage,  collected  again  and  car- 
ried off  in  sewage  tunnels  to  some  safe  destination. 
The  old-time  Berlin  had  drained  into  the  Spree,  and 
had  used  vaults  for  solid  waste  instead  of  the  modern 
all-receiving  sewers.  Good  drainage  was  as  neces- 
sary as  good  water,  and  the  discharge  of  unpurified 
sewage  into  the  Spree  as  a  permanent  system  was  out 
of  the  question.  Artificial  purification,  and  the  manu- 
facture of  fertilizers  from  the  precipitated  solids 
would  have  been  possible ;  but  Berlin  wisely  adopted 
the  better  plan  of  natural  purification  by  the  irrigat- 
ing of  land.  Immense  research  was  bestowed  upon 
the  subject,  with  the  result  that  the  Berlin  drainage 
is  the  most  perfect  in  the  world  and  is  unquestionably 
that  city's  most  notable  achievement  in  municipal 
housekeeping,  so  far  as  physical  forms  and  conditions 
are  concerned.  The  city  was  divided  into  twelve 
drainage  districts,  called  "radial  systems,"  the  divi- 
sions being  arranged  upon  considerations  of  topogra- 
phy. The  sewers  of  each  district  were  to  converge 
at  a  common  center,  at  which  would  be  located  a  re- 
ceiving-basin and  steam-pumping  works.  A  tunnel 
was  to  connect  each  of  these  district  centers  with  the 
reservoirs  and  pumping- works  of  a  sewage  farm  some 
miles  distant. 

The  work  upon  this  vast  project  began  about  the 
middle  of  the  decade  1870-80,  each  radial  system 
being  dealt  with  independently.  By  1880,  systems 
I.,  II.,  and  III.  had  been  put  into  use,  and  thus  the  in- 
ner sections  of  the  city,  including  the  business  core, 

were  connected  with  a  large  area  of  municipal  farm- 
22 


CHAP.  VI. 


Abandon- 
ment of  the 
Spree. 


Adoption  of 

irrigation 

system. 


The  radial 
systems. 


The  project 
begun. 


338 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


Completing 

the 
"systems." 


CHAP.  vi.  land  lying  some  fifteen  or  twenty  miles  southward. 
System  IV.,  embracing  the  north  central  part  of  Ber- 
lin on  the  upper  side  of  the  Spree,  was  also  ready  for 
use  before  1880,  and  was  connected  with  a  very  ex- 
tensive tract  of  land  lying  a  few  miles  northeast  of 
the  city.  System  V.,  pertaining  to  the  great  eastern 
residence  portion  of  Berlin,  was  opened  in  1881, 
although  general  house-connection  was  not  complete 
until  1886.  Systems  VI.  and  VII.,  draining  the  south- 
ern outskirts,  and  including  portions  of  the  suburban 
towns  of  Charlottenburg  and  Schoneberg,  were  in  full 
service  by  1887.  Systems  VIII.  and  IX.  lie  north  of 
the  Spree  at  the  extreme  western  limits  of  the  city. 
System  X.  is  on  the  north  side  and  embraces  new 
and  partly  built-up  quarters,  while  Systems  XI.  and 
XII.  are  on  the  eastern  limits.  System  VIII.,  drain- 
ing due  north  to  a  third  great  body  of  municipal  land 
through  a  tunnel  perhaps  ten  miles  long,  was  ready 
for  use  in  1891,  as  also  was  System  X.  The  remain- 
ing systems  were  not  urgently  needed,  and  work 
upon  them  was  allowed  to  proceed  more  slowly. 

Excepting  for  some  thinly  populated  outskirts, 
therefore,  all  the  houses  of  Berlin  are  now  connected 
with  the  new  drainage-works,  which  are  carrying 
annually  from  60,000,000  to  70,000,000  cubic  meters 
of  sewage  to  be  distributed  by  scientific  irrigation 
over  the  surface  of  municipal  farms  having  an  ag- 
gregate extent  of  more  than  twenty  thousand  acres, 
or  upwards  of  thirty  square  miles.  Additional  land 
has  been  bought  from  time  to  time.  It  is  interesting 
to  note  that  a  city  whose  municipal  limits  include 
only  twenty-five  square  miles  should  have  acquired  an 
outside  domain  of  thirty  square  miles  as  a  place  for  the 
discharge  of  its  liquid  waste.  The  Berlin  sewage 
farms  were  tracts  of  rather  poor  and  sandy  soil ;  but 
land  is  not  very  cheap  in  the  vicinity  of  so  great  a  city, 


Extent  of 

the  sewage 

farms. 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


339 


and  the  purchase  money  reached  about  15,000,000 
marks.  An  additional  15,000,000  marks  had  been 
spent  prior  to  1893  in  laying  out  the  farms,  trench- 
ing and  tiling  them  for  irrigation  purposes,  and  equip- 
ping them  with  the  necessary  buildings  and  improve- 
ments. At  that  time  there  had  been  expended  upon 
the  radial  systems  in  Berlin  and  the  discharging  tun- 
nels about  65,000,000  marks,  making  a  total  invest- 
ment of  nearly  10,0000,000.  With  the  further  outlay 
to  be  made  in  completion  of  the  system  as  a  whole, 
the  new  Berlin  sewage-works,  including  the  farms 
and  their  improvements,  may  perhaps  be  said  to  con- 
stitute a  120,000,000  mark  ($30,000,000)  plant. 

It  is  novel  from  an  American  point  of  view  to  con- 
sider a  city's  drainage-works  as  a  self-sustaining  or 
productive  enterprise,  like  its  water- works  and  its  gas- 
works. But  Berlin  regards  the  matter  in  that  light. 
Before  the  new  system  was  introduced,  the  citizens 
had  to  pay  for  the  removal  of  night-soil,  etc.  The 
city  now  charges  a  moderate  sewage-rate  against  all 
property  that  the  system  serves.  The  parts  of  the 
farms  that  have  been  brought  under  closest  cultivation 
are  already  very  profitable,  although  the  net  income 
from  the  entire  thirty  square  miles  does  not  yet  pay 
the  full  interest  on  the  investment  (for  purchase  and 
improvement)  of  30,000,000  marks.  The  fertilizing 
value  of  the  sewage  is  so  great,  and  the  administra- 
tion of  the  farms  is  so  superb,  that  within  a  very  few 
years  the  investment  will  have  become  enormously 
productive.  On  each  of  the  farms  are  nurseries  of 
young  fruit-trees,  and  considerable  areas  of  orchard 
have  already  begun  to  yield  some  fruitage.  Prodi- 
gious crops  of  vegetables  are  grown,  and  the  yield 
per  acre  of  cereals  and  grass  is  similarly  remarkable. 
Within  a  reasonable  period  the  sewage  farms  will 
have  earned  profits  enough  to  pay  back  all  that  was 


CHAP.  VI. 


Cost  of  the 
new  drain- 
age works. 


Financial 
outlook. 


Profitable 
farming. 


340 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Sanitary 
success. 


Hamburg's 

notable 
experience. 


A  great 

filtration 

plant. 


invested  in  them,  and  eventually  they  will  be  a  source 
of  surplus  income  that  will  materially  lessen  the  load 
of  municipal  taxation.  Meanwhile,  from  the  sanitary 
point  of  view,  the  system  is  an  unqualified  success. 
Far  from  being  unwholesome,  moreover,  for  the  peo- 
ple who  live  and  work  upon  them,  the  farms  them- 
selves are  so  free  from  deleterious  influences  that  con- 
valescent colonies  from  the  city  hospitals  have  now 
been  established  on  them,  with  gratifying  results. 

The  problems  of  water-supply  and  drainage  —  one 
or  both  —  have  in  recent  years  forced  themselves 
upon  many  other  German  cities  besides  Berlin. 
Hamburg's  experience  is  especially  worthy  of  note. 
The  second  city  in  the  empire,  with  a  population  of 
600,000,  with  great  wealth  and  vast  shipping  and  com- 
mercial interests,  Hamburg  had  long  been  aware  of 
the  need  of  a  pure  water-supply.  Its  situation  in  a 
flat  region  at  the  head  of  tidal  water  in  the  Elbe 
had  seemed  to  make  necessary  the  continued  use  of 
the  river- water,  in  spite  of  its  unwholesome  condition. 
But  Hamburg  received  a  great  impetus  in  all  direc- 
tions from  its  inclusion  in  the  German  Zollverein  a 
few  years  ago,  and  from  the  success  of  the  joint  mu- 
nicipal and  imperial  project  of  immense  harbor  im- 
provements. As  had  happened  earlier  in  Berlin,  a 
conjunction  of  political,  commercial,  and  sanitary 
motives  now  stirred  the  Hamburg  authorities  to  an 
unprecedented  activity.  A  magnificent  new  City 
Hall,  to  be  opened  in  1894,  was  entered  upon  as  a 
symbol  of  the  new  municipal  era.  As  the  prime  san- 
itary reform,  it  was  determined  to  construct  the 
greatest  and  most  complete  filtration-plant  in  the 
world,  to  supply  the  city  with  an  unlimited  quantity 
of  Elbe  water,  purified  to  meet  the  severest  tests  of 
chemist  and  bacteriologist.  The  new  works  were  un- 
der construction  when  the  frightful  cholera  epidemic 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  341 

of  1892  swept  away  thousands  of  victims.  It  was  de-  CHAP.  vi. 
monstrated  that  the  disease  had  been  propagated 
through  the  use  of  Elbe  water,  and  that  nitration 
would  remove  the  cholera  germs.  The  new  works 
were  to  have  been  ready  for  use  in  1894 ;  but  by  great 
effort  they  were  completed  and  put  into  operation  in 
May,  1893.  During  the  summer  and  autumn  the  river 
water,  when  introduced  into  the  subsidence  basins  and 
filters,  contained  millions  of  cholera  germs  to  the 
cubic  inch.  As  it  emerged  and  was  supplied  to  the 
city,  the  water  was  as  safe  and  wholesome  as  if  it  had 
been  brought  from  high  Alpine  sources.  The  filtered 
water  averted  the  return  of  the  epidemic  in  1893.  So 
striking  an  object-lesson  in  municipal  health  admin- 
istration has  never  been  presented  before,  and  its 
effect  will  have  been  felt  everywhere  in  Europe.  The 
cholera  invasion  led  Hamburg  to  adopt  various  sani- 
tary reforms,  and  I  shall  discuss  them  more  particu- 
larly in  the  next  chapter.  Hamburg's  sewers  form  a 
fairly  complete  modern  system,  but  the  city  has  not 
finally  solved  its  problem  of  sewage  disposal.  At 
present  the  entire  volume  is  carried  in  a  huge  collect- 
ing  tunnel  to  a  point  below  the  city,  where  it  is  emp- 
tied into  the  river  during  the  hours  when  the  tidal 
movement  is  seaward,  and  dammed  back  when  the 
tide  flows  in.  But  the  amount  is  too  great  to  be 
carried  out  satisfactorily,  and  much  of  it  pours  back 
to  foul  the  harbor  with  the  turn  of  the  tide.  Ulti- 
mately Hamburg  must  adopt  a  plan  of  artificial  puri- 
fication, after  the  example  of  London,  or  else  must 
follow  Berlin's  still  better  example  of  natural  filtra- 
tion through  the  soil  of  sewage  farms. 

Breslau,  which  ranks  fifth  in  population  among  the 

German  cities,  and  is  the  second  city  of  Prussia,  is  too 

little  known  to  the  English-speaking  world.     It  is 

one  of  the  model  municipalities,  and  its  administra- 

22* 


342 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Filtered 
river  water 
and  sewage 

farms. 


Munich's 

Alpine 

water  and 

its  effects. 


tion  deserves  high  praise  for  many  excellent  features. 
Dr.  Forckenbeck,  who  served  for  so  many  years  as 
the  upper  burgomaster  of  Berlin,  and  under  whose 
masterly  administration  so  many  of  Berlin's  most 
noteworthy  undertakings  were  accomplished,  had 
previously  distinguished  himself  at  Breslau  in  a  like 
position.  The  town  lies  on  both  banks  of  the  river 
Oder,  from  which  stream  it  pumps  its  water-supply. 
It  has  for  some  years  successfully  filtered  the  water, 
and  it  also  has  carried  into  full  execution  a  system 
of  modern  sewers  and  riesel-felder  (sewage  farms) 
which  leaves  little  to  be  desired.  The  water- works 
are  a  source  of  large  net  income  to  the  city,  and  the 
farms,  which  are  rented  to  tenants,  seem  also  to  be 
a  profitable  investment,  quite  apart  from  the  indi- 
rect benefits  of  a  system  so  satisfactory  from  the 
sanitary  standpoint.  The  entire  population  is  served 
by  the  water-works,  and  all  the  house  and  street 
drains  empty  into  the  tunnels  that  discharge  in  the 
basins  of  the  riesel-felder. 

Munich  had  long  suffered  from  an  unenviable  rep- 
utation throughout  Europe  for  its  high  mortality- 
rate,  and  particularly  for  the  prevalence  of  malignant 
forms  of  typhoid  fever.  There  were  thousands  of 
cases  of  fever  every  year,  and  the  number  of  deaths 
from  that  cause  alone  was  high  in  the  hundreds, —  in 
some  years  exceeding  a  thousand.  In  1883  a  new 
water-supply  from  pure  springs  in  the  Alps  was 
brought  into  Munich,  tainted  wells  were  closed,  and 
the  foul  river-water  was  superseded  for  drinking 
purposes.  As  soon  as  the  new  order  of  things  had 
become  fairly  established,  the  yearly  deaths  from 
typhoid  fever  could  almost  be  counted  upon  the  fin- 
gers of  one's  two  hands.  The  new  water-supply  of 
Munich  was  attended  by  other  sanitary  reforms,  in- 
cluding improved  sewers  and  the  substitution  of  a 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


343 


magnificent  municipal  abattoir  with  all  modern  con- 
veniences and  ample  cattle  markets  and  yards,  for 
about  eight  hundred  small  private  slaughter-houses 
that  had  existed  in  different  parts  of  the  city.  The 
introduction  of  Alpine  water  seemed  a  bold  under- 
taking at  the  time ;  but  it  has  been  an  easy  matter  to 
make  the  works  earn  surplus  profits  after  paying  all 
expenses  and  providing  for  interest  and  sinking-fund. 

All  German  cities,  with  a  few  unimportant  excep- 
tions, now  own  and  operate  water- works,  which  are 
made  to  earn  profits  averaging  from  ten  to  fifteen 
per  cent,  on  the  amounts  invested.  Frankfort-on- 
the-Main  has  within  a  few  years  invested  something 
like  30,000,000  marks  in  improved  water-works  and 
sewers,  and  brought  about  an  improvement  in  health 
conditions  that  has  been  most  extraordinary.  The 
water  is  taken  from  several  sources,  and  is  of  good 
average  quality.  The  sewage  is  discharged  into  the 
river,  after  having  undergone  treatment  by  chemico- 
mechanical  means  for  clearing  and  purifying, —  the 
precipitated  sludge  being  sold  as  a  fertilizer.  The 
results,  as  shown  in  a  diminished  death-rate  and  the 
disappearance  of  certain  forms  of  disease,  have  been 
even  more  notable  than  the  change  at  Munich. 

Braunschweig,  or  Brunswick  as  we  call  it  in  Eng- 
lish, illustrates  admirably  the  transforming  effect  of 
the  new  municipal  spirit.  In  1861  the  city  celebrated 
the  one  thousandth  anniversary  of  its  founding.  It 
was  then  a  compact  town  of  perhaps  40,000  people, 
and  medieval  in  architecture  and  characteristics.  It 
is  now  a  lively  manufacturing  city  of  more  than  100,- 
000  inhabitants,  and  is  still  growing  rapidly.  It  has 
lately  adopted  the  plan  of  sewage  farms,  having  com- 
pleted a  modern  system  of  filtered  water-supply.  Its 
wonderful  wealth  of  old  collections  illustrating  art 
and  history  has  been  brought  into  curious  touch  with 


CHAP.  VI. 


Municipal 
abattoirs 
and  other 
Munich  im- 
provements. 


Frankfort's 
water-works 

and  sewage 
purification. 


Brunswick's 
expansion 
and  reno- 
vation. 


Water  and 

sewer 
systems. 


344  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vi.  new  institutions  for  practical  and  popular  education. 
Under  its  newly-paved  streets  are  new  sewers;  and  in 
its  quaint  and  famous  timber-built  houses,  erected 
hundreds  of  years  ago,  one  finds  modern  plumbing  of 
the  last  twenty  years  in  universal  use.  The  commin- 
gling of  the  new  and  the  old  in  this  revivified  medieval 
capital  is  merely  representative  of  what  has  been 

A  type.of    brought  about  since  1870  in  scores  of  ancient  German 

numerous  .    .  . 

towns.  towns.  The  municipal  self-consciousness  has  been 
marvelously  awakened,  with  results  that  make  the 
story  of  expansion  and  progress  in  our  American 
cities  seem  quite  prosaic. 

I  have  perhaps  dwelt  too  long  upon  what  the  Ger- 
mans call  the  wasserung  and  entwcisserung  of  their 
"Wasserung"  cities.     But  I  have  chosen  to  do  so  because  it  seems 
"serung.*  '  to  me  that  this  double  topic  of  water-supply  and 
drainage  is  most  truly  typical  of  that  varied  physical 
regeneration  that  cities  must  undergo  in  order  to  be  the 
fit  abode  of  modern  communities.    I  am  not  compiling 
a  directory  of  German  municipal  improvements,  or 
Dantzic's     else  I   should  have  to  compliment  Dantzic  for  its 
aments?"     water,  its  sewers  and  riesel-f  elder,  and  its  general  dem- 
onstration of  the  manner  in  which  a  quaint  walled 
city  and  provincial  capital  of  the  fifteenth  century  can 
within  two  decades  make  itself  a  great  seaport  by 
dredging  its  shallow  harbor  to  admit  modern  steam- 
ers ;  can  give  its  population  a  new  prosperity  through 
the  development  of  manufactures;  and  can  lift  them  in 
the  scale  of  intelligence  and  happiness  through  pro- 
visions for  education  and  for  the  unfortunate. 

street-clean-  Clean  streets  and  alleys,  and  immaculate  back  yards, 
were  certainly  not  conspicuously  characteristic  of 
German  cities  twenty  years  ago.  But  the  recent  im- 
provements in  water-supply  and  drainage,  as  well  as 
in  general  sanitary  administration,  might  naturally 


THE  GEKMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


345 


The  Berlin 
system. 


be  expected  to  have  the  accompaniment  of  reformed  CHAP.  vi. 
cleansing  arrangements.  Moreover,  clean  streets  had 
been  made  feasible  by  the  smooth,  new  paving  of 
roadways  and  sidewalks.  As  a  rule,  the  streets  of 
German  cities  are  now  kept  in  a  state  of  enviable 
cleanliness.  Berlin's  thoroughfares  are  scrubbed  and 
swept  continually,  under  a  system  that  is  perfectly 
organized,  and  that  costs  less  than  $500,000  a  year.  It 
is  a  flexible  system,  providing  for  the  prompt  increase 
of  workmen  in  bad  weather,  and  never  helpless  in  the 
presence  of  a  sudden  snowfall.  The  central  streets  of 
all  the  leading  German  cities  are  thoroughly  cleansed 
once  a  day,  at  night  or  very  early  in  the  morning,  in 
addition  to  which  "  flying  columns  "  of  street-cleaners 
are  on  constant  day  duty  to  remove  horse  manure  and 
other  accumulations.  In  the  residence  quarters  of 
many  German  cities  it  is  still  the  rule  that  street- 
sweeping  is  an  obligation  that  rests  upon  the  prop- 
erty-owners or  occupiers.  But  Berlin,  Dresden,  Ham- 
burg, Frankfort,  and  some  smaller  cities,  provide  a  full 
municipal  service,  while  in  Leipsic,  Cologne,  Stuttgart, 
and  other  places,  the  cleansing  is  partly  municipal  and 
partly  private.  Munich,  Breslau,  and  numerous  smaller 
places  throw  the  entire  burden  upon  the  owners  of 
adjacent  property.  The  tendency  is  toward  the  direct, 
full  municipal  service.  But  the  important  fact  is  that 
under  all  the  different  systems  the  municipal  authori- 
ties prescribe  the  rules  and  regulations,  and  see  that 
they  are  carried  out.  Labor  is  so  cheap  and  abundant 
that  it  is  easy  for  the  German  householder  to  arrange 
for  the  regular  cleansing  of  his  sidewalk  and  his  share 
of  street  frontage.  The  municipality,  as  a  rule,  at- 
tends on  its  own  account  to  the  removal  of  the  sweep- 
ings. It  has  also  become  the  prevailing  practice  in 
German  cities  to  make  the  removal  and  disposal  of 
domestic  ashes  and  garbage  a  municipal  function,  and 


Extent  of 

municipal 

service. 


Garbage 
removal. 


346  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vi.    this  service  is  conjoined  with  that  of  removing  the 
street  sweepings. 

So  far  as  I  am  aware,  Dresden  is  the  most  fastidi- 
Dresden's  ously  dean  of  all  the  German  cities.  It  extends  the 
cleansing,  uniform  daily  cleansing  to  a  large  area.  Berlin's  dis- 
trict of  daily  cleansing  is  comparatively  small;  but 
the  area  whose  streets  are  swept  from  three  to  five 
times  a  week  is  large,  and  all  the  important  outlying 
streets  are  well  cleansed  twice  a  week.  If  I  should 
name  the  small  sums  for  which  Hamburg,  Dresden, 
Bremen,  Dusseldorf,  Essen,  and  other  cities  obtain 
remarkably  thorough  and  satisfactory  results,  I  am 
afraid  I  should  not  be  believed  by  American  munici- 
pal authorities.  Everywhere  in  Germany  one  notes 
the  perfect  organization  of  these  services,  and  their 
rapid  improvement  as  the  standards  of  civilized  life 
become  more  rigorous.  The  trend  in  Germany  is 

Unifiedman-  "  .  .  J 

agementof   toward  a  unified  direct  municipal  service  of  street 
sprinkling    cleansing,    sprinkling,    and    garbage   removal;    and 
a  removalf5   while  much  diversity  of  system  exists  at  present,  there 
is  no  failure  in  any  large  German  town  of  that  exer- 
cise of  full  municipal  authority  and  responsibility 
which  prescribes  what  shall  be  done  and  sees  that  the 
prescription  is  carried  out. 

About  two  thirds  of  the  large  German  cities  own 

Municipal  •    •       •,  -mi- 

gas-plants,    and  operate  gas-works  as  municipal  enterprises.    The 

list  of  such  cities  numbers  approximately  thirty. 
Public  lighting,  under  modern  conditions,  has  grown 
to  be  a  very  extensive  and  necessary  social  service. 
Nearly  a  quarter  of  all  the  artificial  light  required  by 
the  denizens  of  many  modern  European  cities  is  used 
in  streets  and  public  places.  Obviously,  the  cities 
that  reserve  the  gas-supply  as  a  municipal  monopoly 
are  enabled  to  provide  for  public  lighting  at  the  lowest 
absolute  cost  of  manufacture.  With  the  unlimited 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


347 


Tendencies 
of  public 
ownership. 


technical  and  administrative  skill  that  they  control,  CHAP.  vi. 
the  German  cities  are  in  my  judgment  at  a  distinct 
advantage  over  private  corporations  in  the  economi- 
cal conduct  of  the  gas  business.  The  tendency  of 
municipal  ownership  is,  moreover,  toward  a  more 
complete  street  illumination  and  a  more  thoroughly 
diffused  private  use  of  an  article  that  is  at  once  a 
civilizing  agent  and  a  police  protection.  As  a  monop- 
oly enterprise  it  is  of  course  easy  to  make  the  works 
pay  good  profits.  The  cities  which  are  now  supplied 
by  private  companies  will  probably,  one  after  another, 
as  franchise  periods  terminate,  assume  municipal 
control.  Everything  indicates  such  a  policy. 

Meanwhile,  most  of  these  cities  secure  gas  for  pub- 
lic illumination  at  greatly  reduced  prices,  and  the 
cost  to  private  consumers  is  strictly  regulated.  Mu-  Public  con- 
nich  is  the  largest  of  the  cities  that  are  supplied  by  a  vlte  plants. 
private  company;  and  I  remember  at  one  time  ob- 
serving with  satisfaction  that  the  municipal  laboratory 
of  that  city  tests  the  illuminating  power  of  the  gas 
every  day,  in  order  to  protect  the  citizens  from  an  in- 
ferior quality.  This  Munich  circumstance  fairly  illus- 
trates the  full  municipal  supervision  that  is  exercised 
in  Germany  over  the  gas-supply,  even  when  under 
private  ownership.  For  the  benefit  of  American  cities 
entertaining  the  absurd  delusion  that  there  can  be 
beneficial  competition  in  the  gas  business,  it  should! 
be  remarked  that  only  one  of  all  the  cities  of  Ger- 
many, namely,  Frankfort-on-the-Main,  has  chartered 
rival  private  gas  companies ;  and  the  price  of  gas  is 
higher  there  than  anywhere  else  in  the  country. 
Among  the  cities  that  own  their  own  gas-works  are 
Berlin,  Hamburg,  Breslau,  Leipsic,  Dresden,  Cologne, 
Konigsberg,  Bremen,  Diisseldorf,  Nuremberg,  Dant- 
zic,  Magdeburg,  Chemnitz,  Barmen,  Stettin,  and 
Brunswick.  The  principal  ones  supplied  by  private 


348 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Municipal 
policy  as  re- 
gards elec- 
tric plants. 


Hamburg's 
electric 

plant, —  in 
hands  of 


Other  cities 

which  have 

municipal 

works. 


companies  are  Munich,  Stuttgart,  Frankfort-on-the- 
Main,  Hanover,  Strassburg,  and  Altona. 

In  the  matter  of  municipalizing  electricity,  the 
German  cities  have  moved  somewhat  slowly ;  but  the 
marked  tendency  is  toward  the  appropriation  for  the 
welfare  of  the  community  of  all  advantages  and 
profits  to  be  derived  from  the  distribution  of  light 
and  power  from  central  electric  stations.  The  gov- 
ernmental operation  of  telegraph  and  telephone  lines, 
and  the  municipal  supply  of  gas  for  lighting  and  for 
motors,  had  predisposed  the  German  communities  to 
a  public  control  of  such  newer  services  as  electric 
lighting  and  the  electrical  distribution  of  power.  The 
municipal  authorities  would  naturally  be  reluctant  to 
admit  private  companies  to  any  rights  under  the  street 
surface.  Public  control  of  gas-  and  water-supplies, 
and  of  other  services  requiring  pipes,  tubes,  and  wires, 
has  resulted  in  so  orderly  and  convenient  a  system  of 
underground  conduits  that  it  is  deemed  wise  to  allow 
no  private  companies  to  disturb  it.  Municipal  elec- 
trical works  are  regarded  as  the  logical  development 
of  a  policy  generally  accepted  in  Germany.  Berlin  is 
an  exception  to  the  rule,  perhaps  because  the  feasi- 
bility of  public  control  was  not  so  apparent  when  the 
Berlin  Electrical  Company  obtained  its  franchise. 
The  Berlin  works  were  opened  in  1886. 

Hamburg's  municipal  plant  was  ready  in  1889,  and 
that  city  is  peculiar  among  its  German  contemporaries 
in  the  fact  that  it  leases  out  both  its  gas-works  and 
its  electrical-works  to  be  operated  for  it  by  a  pri- 
vate contractor.  Liibeck,  Barmen,  Konigsberg,  Metz, 
Darmstadt,  and  Duisburg  were  operating  general 
municipal  electrical-works  before  the  end  of  1890. 
More  recently,  the  five  important  cities  of  Breslau, 
Cologne,  Dusseldorf,  Altona,  and  Cassel  had  built 
municipal  plants ;  and  still  later,  both  Dresden  and 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  349 

Stuttgart  decided  to  enter  at  once  upon  the  same    CHAP.  vi. 
policy.     Leipsic,  on  the  other  hand,  has  preferred  a 
different  arrangement,  and  has  given  a  franchise  to     Leipstc-s 

different 

the  Siemens  &  Halske  Company,  on  terms  regarded  as      policy. 
especially  favorable  to  the  city  and  the  public.     The 
works  came  into  operation  in  1895,  and  at  the  end 
of  the  franchise  period,  which  is  a  long  one,  they  are 
to  become  municipal  property  without  cost. 

Although  Berlin  and  Leipsic  have  given  electric- 
light  franchises  to  private  companies,  let  no  reader 
imagine  that  the  interests  of  the  municipalities  and 
of  the  citizens  were  betrayed,  or  left  at  any  point  un- 
guarded. As  an  example  of  what  is  considered  a 
suitable  form  of  franchise  in  Germany,  it  would  be  points  in 
instructive  to  quote  the  entire  revised  contract  made  franchise. 
in  1888  between  the  Berlin  city  authorities  and  the 
Berlin  Electric  Works  Company.  It  defines  the  area 
within  which  the  company  may  operate.  It  re- 
quires, under  heavy  penalties,  that  the  area  be  fully 
provided  with  main  wires  within  a  brief  period  speci- 
fied in  the  contract.  As  compensation  for  permis- 
sion (not  exclusive)  to  use  the  streets,  it  is  agreed 
that  the  municipal  treasury  shall  receive  10  per  cent.  Liberal  com- 
of  the  company's  gross  receipts,  and  further,  that  to  city. 
whenever  the  company  earns  a  net  profit  of  more  than 
6  per  cent,  on  its  actual  investment  of  capital,  the 
city  treasury  shall  receive  25  per  cent,  of  such  excess 
profits,  in  addition  to  its  10  per  cent,  of  the  gross  in- 
come. Still  further,  it  is  agreed  that  the  company 
shall  provide  the  magnificent  electric  illumination  of 

Favorable 

the  central  avenue  Unter-den-Lmden,  together  with     terms  for 
that  of  the  Potsdamer  Platz  and  the  Leipziger  Strasse,     lighting. 
with  all  expense  of  maintenance  and  attendance,  at  a 
price  so  low  as  to  be  nominal.     Besides  this,  a  special 
and  favorable  rate  is  provided  for  such  further  electric 
street-lighting  as  the  municipality  may  desire.     The 


350  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vi.  city  authorities  retain  the  fullest  rights  of  inspection 
both  technical  and  financial,  and  all  the  company's 

Rights  of  '  r       j 

inspection,  affairs  are  open  to  the  knowledge  of  responsible  pub- 
lic officials.  The  city  requires  the  deposit  of  250,000 
marks  as  caution-money,  and  holds  the  company  down 
to  the  strictest  rules  in  regard  to  the  laying  of  wires 
and  breaking  up  of  street  or  sidewalk  surfaces.  The 

Various  pre-  .  .       ,  .          . 

cautions,     company  is  required,  moreover,  to  maintain   a  re- 
newal fund  equal  to  20  per  cent,  of  its  invested  capi- 
tal 5  and  this  fund,  in  the  form  of  Berlin  municipal 
bonds,  must  be  kept  on  deposit  with  the  city  magis- 
trates.   Accompanying  the  agreement  was  an  official 
schedule  of  rates  that  the  company  was  authorized  to 
Rates  to     charge  its  private  patrons.     No  departures  from  es- 
patrons.     tablished  rates  can  be  made  without  consent  of  the 
city  authorities.   Finally,  the  municipality  reserves  the 
right  to  buy  the  entire  plant  and  all  its  appurtenances 
at  any  time  after  October  1, 1895,  upon  a  fair  basis  of 
Right  of  city  valuation  carefully  provided  for  in  the  contract.     The 
plant.       arrangement  in   all  its  details  is  an  elaborate  one, 
but  it  is  the  perfection  of  business  lucidity  and  intel- 
ligence.    What  if  New  York,  Chicago,  Boston,  and 
Philadelphia  had  based  all  their  grants  of  valuable 
municipal  privileges  in  the  past  thirty  years  upon 
principles  as  sound  as  those  that  protect  German  nau- 
i^Germany  nicipal  interests  in  contracts  with  quasi-public  supply 
interestcom-  corporations?    In  studying  these  German  contracts 

mands  the  Jr.  ~      ,°. 

best  talent,  one  is  always  impressed  with  a  sense  of  the  first-class 
legal,  financial,  and  technical  ability  that  the  city  is 
able  to  command;  while  American  contracts  always 
impress  one  with  the  unlimited  astuteness  and  ability 
of  the  gentlemen  representing  the  private  corporations. 

I  should  prefer  to  wait  five  or  even  ten  years  before 

street-rail-    writing  upon  the  relation  of  the  German  municipality 

Germany,     to  street-railways  and  transit  facilities.     The  business 

of  transporting  urban  passengers  is  far  more  highly 


THE  GEKMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


351 


developed  in  America  than  in  Europe.  Our  urban 
populations  are  much  more  widely  distributed,  and 
rely  far  more  upon  public  vehicles.  Most  German 
cities  were  originally  walled  and  very  compact.  The 
large  tenement  building,  several  stories  high,  housing 
numerous  families,  is  the  prevailing  type.  Municipal 
areas  are  small,  and  outlying  suburbs  are  compara- 
tively unimportant.  Families,  whether  in  the  city  or 
in  the  suburbs,  as  a  rule  live  near  their  daily  work. 
All  this  has  begun  to  change  ;  and  a  redistribution  of 
population  over  larger  areas,  under  the  influence  of 
new  industrial  conditions,  and  with  the  increase 
of  cheap  transportation  facilities,  is  now  taking  place 
rapidly  in  Germany,  as  almost  everywhere  in  Europe. 
But  the  magnitude  of  the  movement  will  hardly  make 
itself  realized  for  several  years  to  come ;  and  the 
transit-systems  will  not  have  attained  an  importance 
at  all  comparable  with  those  in  America  before  the 
end  of  another  ten  years. 

Yet  the  horse-railways  of  Berlin,  Hamburg,  Frank- 
fort, Munich,  Leipsic,  Dresden,  Cologne,  Stuttgart, 
and  other  cities  are  to-day  exceedingly  well  managed, 
and  are  thriving  under  a  patronage  that  grows  rap- 
idly from  year  to  year.  The  first  street-railway  in 
Germany  was  a  short  line  opened  at  Berlin  in  1865. 
Excepting  for  small  beginnings  at  Hamburg  and 
Stuttgart,  no  other  German  city  ventured  upon  the  in- 
novation until  1882,  when  Dresden,  Leipsic,  Frank- 
fort and  Hanover  entered  the  list.  In  the  next 
ten  years  more  than  thirty  other  leading  German 
towns  began  their  street-railway  systems.  Nothing 
could  have  been  more  logical  than  an  era  of  street- 
railway  construction  following  upon  an  era  of  new 
street  making  and  paving,  which  had  included  the 
straightening  and  widening  of  main  thoroughfares, 
and  the  development  of  radials  from  town  centers  to 
outer  peripheries. 


CHAP.  VL 


Beginnings 

in  various 

cities. 


352 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


The  Berlin 
company. 


CHAP.  vi.  While  in  several  German  cities  there  is  more  than 
consolidated  one  street-railway  company,  the  prevailing  rule  and 
tendency  is  toward  a  single  system  with  one  central 
management,  brought  under  very  direct  and  inti- 
mate municipal  supervision.  The  money  value  of 
street-railway  franchises  in  Germany  is  beginning  to 
be  considerable,  but  it  will  yet  be  several  years  be- 
fore the  city  treasuries  can  hope  to  realize  large  in- 
comes from  the  rentals  and  tributes  exacted  from 
transit  corporations.  Every  one  who  goes  to  Berlin 
is  now  impressed  with  the  admirably  complete  and 
satisfactory  service  of  horse-cars  that  permeates  the 
whole  city.  Nearly  all  these  lines  belong  to  the 
"  Grosser  Berliner  Pf  erde-Eisenbahn-Actien-Gesell- 
schaft"  (Great  Berlin  Horse  Railway  Stock  Company). 
The  municipal  authorities  have  carefully  projected 
the  new  lines  or  extensions  that  this  system  has  added 
from  time  to  time,  having  in  mind  the  present  and 
future  development  of  the  metropolis.  The  company 
has  paid  lump  sums  for  the  franchises,  varying  from 
a  few  thousands  to  hundreds  of  thousands  of  marks, 
according  to  the  extent  or  probable  paying  character 
of  the  new  line  or  extension.  In  addition,  the  com- 
pany has  assumed  heavy  burdens  with  regard  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  paving  and  cleansing  of  streets 
traversed  by  its  lines,  and  is  further  compelled  to 
make  yearly  cash  payments  to  the  municipal  treasury 
in  return  for  its  privileges,  on  the  basis  of  its  earn- 
ings. At  the  end  of  the  franchise,  in  the  year  1911, 
the  entire  system  falls  to  the  municipality  as  its  own. 
Meanwhile  the  company  pays  to  the  city  an  annual 
cash  sum  that  now  amounts  to  more  than  1,000,000 
marks.  This  results  from  a  percentage  on  gross  re- 
ceipts, the  rate  increasing  as  the  company's  business 
grows.  The  minimum  rate  is  4  per  cent.,  but  for 
several  years  past  7£  per  cent,  or  more  has  been  paid. 


Payments 
to  city. 


THE  GEKMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  353 

Hamburg's  street-railways  pay  a  municipal  tax  on    CHAP.  VL 
each  passenger  carried,  which  would  amount  to  per- 

f  Hamburg 

haps  8  or  10  per  cent,  on  gross  receipts.    Besides      and  its 

.  .  7  ,  .    .  street-rail- 

this,  the  companies  are  subject  to  other  municipal  way  system, 
taxes,  and  have  duties  regarding  the  maintenance  of 
streets.  Their  tracks  will  revert  to  the  city  at  the 
end  of  the  charter  period.  On  the  basis  of  their  pres- 
ent business  they  are  unquestionably  paying  the  mu- 
nicipality as  much  as  they  can  afford.  The  principal 
Hamburg  company  has  not  been  accustomed  to  pay 
its  shareholders  more  than  about  5  per  cent,  a  year; 
and  the  stock  represents  actual  investment.  Like 
Berlin,  Hamburg  is  principally  served  by  a  single 
street-railway  corporation,  other  companies  operating 
one  or  more  lines  to  Altona  or  some  other  suburb. 
Cologne's  recent  enlargement  of  its  limits  and  rapid 
suburban  progress  give  its  transit  system  an  interest- 
ing outlook.  The  "  Koln  Strassenbahn-Gesellschaf  t " 
(Cologne  Street- Rail  way  Company)  is  working  upon  a  The  cologne 
thirty-year  franchise  which  will  expire  in  1916,  when  ai 
the  municipality  will  come  into  ownership  of  the  lines 
without  paying  anything  for  them.  Meanwhile  the 
company  pays  a  small  fixed  yearly  rental  of  perhaps 
ten  thousand  marks,  and  also  pays  to  the  city  15  per 
cent,  of  all  profits  accruing  above  a  5  per  cent,  divi- 
dend to  the  shareholders.  The  Frankfort-on-the-Main 
contract  would  seem  to  be  still  more  favorable  to  the 
city.  Frankfort's  street-railway  company — which 
monopolizes  the  transit  business  except  for  three  or 

.       ,         ,       ,    .  ,.  -ii.-,         What  Frank- 

four  single  electric  or  steam  lines  operated  by  inde-    fort  exacts. 

pendent  companies  and  running  out  to  neighboring 
towns — pays  the  city  a  fixed  annual  rental  of  about 
thirty  thousand  marks,  adds  thereto  6  per  cent,  of  its 
total  gross  receipts,  and  is  further  under  obligation 
to  give  the  city  50  per  cent,  of  all  its  surplus  net 
earnings  above  10  per  cent,  per  annum. 

23 


354 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


The  ap- 
proved form 
of  compen- 
sation. 


Fares 
prescribed.  • 


Reduction 
for  school- 
children. 


Electric 
lines  and 

rapid 
transit. 


And  so  I  might  cite  other  contracts  in  other  cities. 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  with  few  exceptions  the  German 
cities  manage  to  obtain  payments  from  street-railway 
companies  up  to  a  point  fairly  equal  to  the  present 
rental  value  of  the  franchises  they  hold,  besides  taxing 
them  as  heavily  upon  their  invested  capital  and  their 
business  operations  as  they  would  be  taxed  if  they 
were  ordinary  merchants  or  manufacturers.  And  the 
franchise  payments  are  so  arranged  as  to  increase 
with  the  earning  capacity  of  the  privilege.  The  fixed 
tax  or  street-maintenance  charge,  plus  the  gross-re- 
ceipts percentage,  plus  a  contingent  proportion  of 
surplus  net  profits,  is  the  approved  German  form  of 
compensation  for  street-railway  franchises.  Municipal 
supervision  extends  minutely  to  such  questions  as  the 
fixing  of  fares  and  the  frequency  of  service.  There  are 
exceptions  to  the  rule,  but  it  may  be  said  almost  with- 
out qualification  that  for  minimum  distances  the  fare  on 
German  street-cars  is  10  pfennigs  (2£  cents),  and  that 
for  longer  rides  the  passenger  pays  fifteen  or  twenty 
pfennigs,  according  to  the  divisions  of  the  route.  On 
some  lines  the  10-pfennig  fare  holds  good  regardless 
of  distance;  but  all  lines  charge  that  rate  for  a  short 
ride.  In  some  cities  there  are  special  rates  for  pre- 
scribed classes.  For  instance,  I  know  of  at  least  one 
city  where  school-children  are  carried  at  one  third  of 
regular  rates,  as  a  part  of  the  bargain  between  the 
municipality  and  the  company. 

I  shall  not  attempt  to  describe  the  beginnings  of 
electric  transit-systems  in  Germany,  nor  to  discuss 
pending  plans  and  proposals  for  a  so-called  "  rapid- 
transit  "  system  in  Berlin.  It  is  enough  to  say  that  a 
number  of  German  cities  have  allowed  the  experi- 
mental equipment  of  a  trolley  line  or  two,  and  that 
the  scientific  German  mind  is  at  work  upon  every 
phase  of  the  problem  of  electric  railways,  with  the 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  355 

promise  of  results  that  will  in  a  few  years  deserve  the  CHAP.  vi. 
attention  of  other  countries.  At  the  beginning  of  this 
chapter  I  mentioned  Stuttgart's  consent  to  a  trolley 
system.  In  Dresden  a  trolley  line  has  recently  been 
completed,  and  on  various  suburban  routes  in  Ger- 
many that  type  of  electric  railway  is  in  operation. 

All  thorough  students  of  the  problems  of  life  in 
modern  cities  are  now  agreed  that  the  housing  of  the 

,       .       ,,  ,  .  „  ,-r.       ,  •  The  housing 

people  is  the  question  that  requires,  from  this  time  problem, 
forth,  the  deepest  consideration  and  the  boldest  and 
most  serious  treatment.  It  is  a  subject  that  has 
many  phases.  It  was  the  unapproached  excellence  of 
their  statistical  work  that  enabled  the  Germans  to 
grasp  the  social  importance  and  pressing  nature  of 
this  problem.  Circumstances  that  I  have  recounted 
were  and  are  causing  their  cities  to  grow  very  rapidly. 
The  temptation  was  strong  upon  property-owners  to 
make  their  tenement-hives  hold  the  largest  possible  The  making 
swarms.  Rear  buildings  were  hastily  run  up  to  fill  ofs^0ms.rn 
court-room  spaces  that  ought  to  have  been  spared  for 
necessary  air  and  light.  The  German  cities  were  be- 
ginning to  repeat  in  aggravated  form  the  mistakes  of 
the  great  British  industrial  towns  half  a  century  or 
more  ago,  which  left  the  housing  question  unregu- 
lated by  the  authorities,  with  the  consequence  of 
frightful  overcrowding  and  horrible  slums  in  which 
some  form  or  other  of  epidemic  was  prevailing  al- 
most constantly,  in  which  infant  mortality  was  shock- 
ingly great,  and  in  which  vice  and  crime  were  nurtured 
as  in  an  irresistibly  favorable  soil  and  environment. 

The  German  cities  count  and  classify  everything 
with  a  minuteness  that  American  cities  would  think      superb 
absurd.     In  fact,  however,  this  statistical  work  is  of 
all  things  the  best  service  that  German  municipalities 
render  to  their  citizens.    It  was  not  until  after  1880 


356 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Minute 
analysis  of 
mortality 

returns. 


The  one- 
room  fami- 
lies and  their 
enormous 
death-rate. 


Low  death- 
rates  of  the 
well-housed 
classes. 


that  Berlin  began  to  give  the  most  exhaustive  statis- 
tical attention  to  the  relation  of  the  housing  of  the 
people  to  their  condition  of  health.  The  mortality 
statistics  were  at  length  made  to  show  not  merely  the 
death-rate  for  the  whole  city,  but  also  the  rate  for 
each  portion  or  ward  of  the  city,  and  the  figures  were 
so  classified  and  compiled  as  to  show  the  number  and 
proportion  of  deaths  according  to  the  number  of 
rooms  occupied  by  families  and  according  to  the  lo- 
cation of  those  rooms  with  reference  to  street-front 
and  to  street-level, — that  is  to  say,  whether  the  house- 
hold occupied  front  or  back  rooms,  and  whether  those 
rooms  were  on  any  given  floor  from  basement  to  gar- 
ret. The  density  of  population  in  every  section  was 
compared  with  the  height  of  buildings  and  the  amount 
of  unbuilt  space  left. 

In  1885  it  was  found  that  73,000  persons  in  Berlin 
were  living  in  the  condition  of  families  occupying  a 
single  room  in  tenement-houses ;  382,000  were  living 
in  houses  (I  mean  by  "  house  "  th^e  distinct  apartments 
of  a  household)  of  two  rooms  5  432,000  occupied 
houses  of  three  rooms;  and  398,000  were  quartered 
in  the  luxury  of  houses  having  at  least  four  rooms. 
It  was  found  that,  although  the  one-room  dwellers 
were  only  one  sixth  as  numerous  as  the  three-room 
dwellers,  their  rate  of  mortality  was  about  twenty- 
three  times  as  high,  and  the  actual  number  of  deaths 
among  them  was  four  times  as  great.  Compared 
with  the  dwellers  in  houses  of  more  than  four  rooms, 
the  mortality  of  the  one-room  dwellers  was  at  a  thirty- 
times  greater  rate.  In  a  total  population  at  that  time 
of  1,315,000,  the  73,000  people  who  lived  in  one-room 
tenement  quarters  suffered  nearly  half  the  entire 
number  of  deaths.  Their  death-rate  per  thousand 
for  the  year  was  163.5,  or  about  one  sixth  their  entire 
number,  while  the  two-room  dwellers  sustained  a 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  357 

death-rate  of  only  22.5,  the  three-room  dwellers  es-    CHAP.  vi. 
eaped  with  the  marvelously  low  rate  of  7.5,  and  the 
well-to-do  people,  who  had  four  or  more  rooms  for 
their  household,  suffered  by  death  only  at  the  rate  of 
5.4  per  thousand  of  population. 

I  am  of  impression  that  the  relation  of  mortality  in 
cities  to  the  character  of  the  housing  of  the  people 
was  never  before  shown  with  such  frightful  distinct- 
ness as  in  these  Berlin  statistics,  which  were  com-  A  startling 
piled  and  published  in  1888.  We  are  wont  to  regard  tion. 
an  annual  city  death-rate  of  about  20  per  thousand 
of  the  total  population  as  normal,  and  satisfactorily 
small.  We  have  not,  however,  become  accustomed 
to  the  minute  analysis  of  such  a  rate,  which  might 
show  that  the  respectable  and  normal  average  was 
made  up  of  rates  for  different  classes  varying  from 
3  or  4  per  thousand  to  200  per  thousand.  Half  the 
mortality  of  the  Berlin  one-room  dwellers  occurred 
in  households  where  five  or  more  persons  occupied 
the  one  enclosed  space. 

It  would  require  many  pages  to  give  anything  like 
an  adequate  idea  of  the  wide  range  of  the  Berlin  in- 
quiry of  1885.  To  have  discovered  that  in  one  great 
ward  of  the  city  the  death-rate  among  children  of  all  variousrates 

T  .3  i-i.-  3  *  *  ofinfent 

classes  and  conditions  under  one  year  or  age  was  five  mortality. 
times  as  great  as  the  death-rate  for  infants  in  an- 
other great  ward,  was  to  reveal  a  fact  of  thrilling, 
even  of  alarming,  significance.  It  was  important  to 
have  learned  that  in  one  locality  the  deaths  of  young 
infants  constitute  half  the  total  deaths,  while  in  an- 
other locality  only  one  fourth  of  the  death-rate  is  due 
to  infant  mortality.  It  was  worth  while  to  have  as- 
certained the  precise  effects  of  residence  in  basements 
and  in  garrets. 

The  inquiry  bore  prompt  fruit.  The  municipality 
in  1888  adopted  a  new  code  of  building  regulations 


358  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vi.    that  was  aimed  directly  at  the  conditions  of  inequality 
revealed  in  the  extraordinary  statistical  reports,  the 
regulating    character  of  which  I  have  indicated.     Already  the 
building,     city  was   regulating  strictly  such    matters    as    the 
strength  and  fire-proof  qualities  of  buildings,  their 
height  with  reference  to  the  street  width,  the  harmony 
of  the  street  frontage,  and  so  on.     But  now  there 
were  established  drastic  rules  requiring  that  at  least 
one  third  of  every  building  lot  should  be  left  unbuilt 
as  court  space  for  air  and  light ;  forbidding  the  con- 
Provisions    struction  of  apartments  for  human  occupancy  con- 
and  light,     taining  less  than  a  prescribed  minimum   of  cubic 
space,  or  lacking  proper  provision  for  daylight,  venti- 
lation, and  heating.     The  tenement-houses  already  in 
occupancy  were  brought  under  stricter  inspection, 
and  the  authority  of  the  municipality  was  in  various 
ways  employed  to  lessen  the  evils  of  overcrowding, 
and  to  improve  the  average  character  of  the  housing 
of  the  poorest  classes. 

The  results  are  already  becoming  appreciable.     I 
am  confident  that  the  renewed  investigations  of  1895 
will  have  made  possible  a  very  encouraging  compari- 
son with  the  conditions  that  existed  in  1885.     Not  the 
least  interesting  of  the  actions  that  have  been  taken 
houses  pre-    by  the  Berlin  authorities,  in  conjunction  with  the 
asi"districts    governmental  agencies  of  the  adjacent  territory,  has 
and  vicinity,  been  the  laying  off  of  the  whole  present  and  prospec- 
tive area  of  the  Greater  Berlin  in  districts  for  each 
of  which  has  been  prescribed  exactly  the  character  of 
the  houses  that  property-owners  may  erect.     Thus  in 
one  neighborhood  there  shall  be  detached  villas ;  and 
no  one  may  spoil  the  character  of  the  district  by 
erecting  high   apartment-houses.     Such  regulations, 
of  course,  seem  irksome  to  many  persons.     Yet  all 
Limitations    cities  must  come  to  the  inevitable  conclusion  that  the 
ownership,    rights  of  masses  in  crowded  communities  are  superior 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  359 

to  the  whims  of  individuals.     The  pretense  that  pri-    CHAP.  vi. 
vate  ownership  of  land  carries  with  it  any  absolute 
right   to   disregard  general  interests,   is  a  baneful 
heresy  that  is  not  to  be  tolerated  when  it  asserts  its 
impudent  claims. 

Results  of  the  more  special  inquiries  set  on  foot  in 
connection  with  the  last  census  of  Germany  have  re- 
cently become  available,  and  some  of  them  seem  to  me 
intensely  interesting.  For  example,  it  is  highly  signifi- 
cant of  the  efficiency  of  recent  municipal  measures  to 
find  that  the  process  of  depopulating  the  congested  dis-  fromW 
tricts  in  the  heart  of  Berlin  has  fairly  begun.  Thus,  districts. 
while  the  city's  total  population  within  unchanged  mu- 
nicipal boundaries  had,  in  the  five  years  from  1885  to 
1890,  increased  from  about  1,300,000  to  nearly  1,600,- 
000,  there  had  been  a  marked  falling  off  in  the  five  most 
central  districts.  In  one,  there  was  a  loss  of  178  fam- 
ilies for  every  thousand, — nearly  one  fifth.  In  two 
others  the  decline  amounted  to  110  families  for  every 
thousand,  or  more  than  one  tenth.  Meanwhile  the 
outer  districts  had  grown  enormously, —  two  of  them 
doubling  their  population  in  the  five  years.  It  may 
be  said,  therefore,  that  the  general  growth  of  Berlin's  Rapidity 

,'.,,',,  .f  -.-,  of  suburban 

population  has  lately  been  concomitant  with  a  move-  movement. 
ment  from  the  center  toward  the  suburbs  that  is  pro- 
ceeding at  an  even  higher  velocity  than  the  increase 
in  total  numbers.  The  new  construction  of  houses 
conforms  with  the  strict  sanitary  regulations  to  which 
I  have  referred,  and  with  the  broad  and  bold  projects 
of  the  municipality  for  the  control  of  population-den- 
sity in  all  the  new  neighborhoods. 

Berlin's  population  as  yet  is  almost  wholly  housed 
in  tenement  or  apartment  buildings.     The  number    tenements. 
of    households,  or  distinct  housekeeping   establish- 
ments, was  in  1890  about  367,000;   and  these  were 
included  in  some  21,600  buildings.     The  average  was 


360 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  vi.  about  seventeen  families  under  each  roof,  comprising 
about  seventy-five  persons.  Including  the  emperor 
and  his  nobles,  and  all  the  rich  families  of  Berlin, 
there  were  only  about  2200  households  out  of  307,000 
that  had  rooms  on  more  than  one  floor;  and  of  the 
2200  nearly  1400  were  connected  with  business  rooms. 
That  is  to  say,  the  1400  families  had  a  living-room 
or  two  "back  of  the  shop,"  and  some  more  space 
up-stairs.  Fewer  than  six  hundred  families  had 

number  of    private  houses  totally  separate  from  business  uses, 

separate        „  ,      .  .      ,.    ...       ,  -T  _ 

houses.  i  or  their  own  individual  occupancy.  JNot  one  iam- 
ily  in  six  hundred  in  Berlin  lives  in  what  Ameri- 
cans call  a  "  house,"  as  distinguished  from  a  "  flat  "  or 
an  apartment  in  a  tenement  building.  The  average 
size  of  Berlin's  tenement  buildings  has  been  increasing 
materially.  The  buildings  that  shelter  less  than 
about  forty  people  were  not  in  1890  so  numerous  by 
one  tenth  as  in  1880.  Those  occupied  by  from  50  to 
100  people  had  increased  about  40  per  cent,  in  number, 
while  those  that  house  from  100  to  300  people  had 
increased  from  50  per  cent,  to  300  per  cent.,  the  in- 

. 

crease  being  more  rapid  according  to  size.  About 
half  the  inhabitants  of  the  city  now  live  in  buildings 
containing  not  fewer  than  one  hundred  people.  Such 
a  system  has  its  advantages  and  its  disadvantages. 
It  makes  the  distribution  of  water  and  gas  easier,  and 
renders  perfect  sewer  connections  more  feasible.  Ev- 
erything depends  upon  the  question  whether  or  not  the 
building  is  a  proper  one  of  its  kind.  In  1885  about 
120,000  Berliners  lived  in  cellar  or  basement  rooms. 
The  actual  number  of  such  subterranean  dwellers 
was  about  the  same  in  1890,  but  the  relative  number 
had  decreased  somewhat.  It  is  the  policy  of  the  au- 
thorities to  discourage  or  forbid  as  rapidly  as  pos- 
sible the  occupancy  of  unwholesome  basements. 
Berlin  is  not  alone  in  the  employment  of  measures 


type  of 

apartment 

houses, 


Basement 
dwellers. 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


361 


to  promote  improved  housing.  All  the  other  lead- 
ing German  cities  have  made  similar  statistical  inves- 
tigations, and  most  of  them  are  endeavoring  to  re- 
form the  evils  that  they  now  fully  comprehend. 
Breslau's  population  is  the  most  seriously  congested 
in  all  Germany,  the  number  of  one-room  families 
being  almost  incredible.  Including  some  forty  thou- 
sand people  who  enjoy  the  privilege  of  a  zubehor  (a 
small  uuwarmed,  closet-like  appurtenance  of  a  room), 
there  were  in  1885  not  less  than  150,000  people,  out 
of  a  total  Breslau  population  of  287,000,  who  lived  in 
houses  of  only  one  warmable  room.  It  should  be  re- 
marked that  beside  the  73,000  Berliners  who  lived  on 
the  absolutely  one-room  family  basis,  there  were  498,- 
000  who  had  only  one  main  living-room  per  household, 
but  were  lifted  somewhat  above  the  status  of  the 
73,000  by  possessing  the  boon  of  one  or  two  of  those 
precious  closets  that  the  Germans  call  a  zubehor. 
Dresden  appears  to  the  visitor  so  spacious  and  lovely 
that  it  is  hard  to  believe  that  its  working  classes  are 
huddled  miserably  into  one-room  tenement  apart- 
ments. Yet  it  was  true  in  1885  that  110,000  people, 
out  of  a  total  Dresden  population  of  228,000,  were 
living  in  the  condition  of  families  occupying  one  main 
room.  Fortunately  most  of  these  Dresden  people 
were  able  to  command  the  advantage  of  a  zubehor 
closet  as  a  possible  retreat  from  the  otherwise  absolute 
necessity  of  being  born,  eating,  sleeping,  suffering, 
and  dying  within  the  four  walls  of  one  stuffy  room. 
Among  the  smaller  cities,  the  housing  conditions  of 
Magdeburg  and  Gorlitz  have  been  notably  bad.  Con- 
siderably more  than  half  of  Magdeburg's  population 
has  belonged  to  the  status  of  the  one-room  dwellers. 
Hamburg  has  housed  a  full  quarter  of  its  population 
on  this  dense  plan,  and  its  compact  neighbor  Altona 
has  had  to  confess  a  much  worse  condition  of  affairs. 


CHAP.  VI. 


Housing  in 
other  cities. 


Breslau's 

bad 
condition. 


As  to  the 

so-called 

'two-room" 

families 

of  Berlin. 


The  one<- 

room  popUK 

lation  of 

Dresden.. 


Magdeburg 
and  Gorlitz. 


Hamburg 
and  Altona. 


362 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


Leipsic  and 
Munich. 


visible. 


CHAP.  vi.  Leipsie  and  Munich,  the  third  and  fourth  cities  of 
Germany,  afford  strikingly  better  accommodations  for 
their  working-people. 

Happily,  in  all  these  cities  the  worst  is  already  past. 
The  conditions  revealed  in  1885  have  led  to  municipal 

General  im-   policies  that  are  making  appreciably  for  a  better  aver- 

provement      *  .  •>•  n   -\ 

age  quantity  and  quality  of  house-room.  The  half- 
decade  shows  gains.  The  suburban  policy  prevails 
everywhere.  The  results  of  the  detailed  inquiry  of 
1895  will  have  made  apparent  the  beginnings  of  a 
housing  reform  that  may  be  characterized  as  a  rapid 
evolution,  rather  than  a  revolution  such  as  Glasgow 
and  certain  other  cities  have  at  one  time  or  another 
instituted. 

To  have  understood  somewhat  the  housing  condi- 
tions of  which  I  have  been  writing  is  the  more  read- 
ily to  grasp  the  principles  and  appreciate  the  methods 
of  the  general  health  arrangements  and  sanitary  over- 
sight that  the  German  cities  have  established.  Wa- 
ter, drainage,  and  cleansing  systems  having  already 
been  described,  it  is  plain  that  the  health  service  of 
next  importance  is  the  provision  for  controlling  in- 
fectious and  contagious  diseases.  Berlin's  sanitary 
system  has  been  growing  more  and  more  perfect  for 
many  years.  Isolation  in  crowded  tenement-houses 
being  practically  impossible,  the  city  has  constructed 
on  the  most  elaborate  scale  great  hospitals  for  the 
treatment  of  all  forms  of  epidemic  malady.  Disin- 
fection stations  also,  fitted  up  with  huge  apparatus 

Disinfection  " 

for  the  treatment  of  clothing,  bedding,  and  various 
movables  from  homes  where  cases  of  infection  have 
been  found,  are  in  constant  use.  Berlin  has  no  further 
fear  of  inability  to  cope  with  any  hitherto  dreaded 
f  orm  of  contagious  or  infectious  disease  ;  for  its  health 
appliances  are  in  readiness  for  the  most  dire  emer- 


Isolation  of 

infectious 

disease. 


stations, 


immunity 


THE  GEEMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  363 

gency  that  experience  has  taught  its  medical  and  bac-  CHAP.  vi. 
teriological  experts  to  anticipate  as  possible.  It  has 
for  many  years  enjoyed  the  services  and  advice  of 
Professor  Virchow  as  a  member  of  the  municipal  gov- 
ernment ;  and  its  health  department  is  manned  or  im- 
mediately counseled  by  a  brilliant  array  of  scientific 
talent.  Moreover,  the  rank  and  file  of  the  various 
sanitary  services  is  full  of  skilled,  highly-trained  offi- 
cials. Recent  tests  have  shown  that  Berlin  can  defy 
even  the  cholera ;  and  as  for  typhus,  small-pox,  and 
other  dreaded  scourges,  they  seem  near  the  point  of 
total  extermination.  Even  consumption  has  been 
marked  for  governmental  conquest  by  Germany's  mili-  similar 

.  .  conditions 

tant  men  01  science.  Hamburg,  Munich,  Dresden,  in  other 
Leipsic,  and  various  other  German  cities  have  estab-  towns. 
lished  similarly  complete  services  for  the  protection 
of  their  people  against  the  epidemic  spread  of  infection. 
I  should  rank  as  next  in  importance  the  vast  estab- 
lishments that  German  cities  have  been  bold  enough 
to  provide  for  the  health  control  of  food-supplies.  I 
have  already  alluded  to  the  magnificent  central  mu-  Health  con- 
nicipal  abattoirs  and  cattle-markets  of  Munich, 
opened  about  the  year  1887,  with  the  compulsory  clos- 
ing of  hundreds  of  small  private  slaughter-houses. 
Berlin  had  entered  upon  this  policy  several  years 
earlier,  and  had  opened  in  1883,  on  opposite  sides  of 
the  city,  two  great  establishments,  wholly  superseding 
a  business  that,  a  few  years  before,  had  been  dis- 
tributed through  nearly  a  thousand  private  slaughter 
houses  and  yards.  The  cost  of  these  Berlin  institu- 
tions, including  the  great  central  cattle-markets  which 
come  under  the  same  administrative  department,  ag- 
gregated a  sum,  I  am  informed,  approaching  20,000,- 
000  marks.  The  policy  adopted  was  to  fix  a  scale 
of  fees  for  the  use  of  the  slaughter-houses  that  would 
pay  cost  of  management,  5  per  cent,  interest  on  the  p 


364 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


No  profits 
permitted. 


Health 
inspection. 


Municipal 
abattoirs 
now  com- 
mon in 
Germany. 


Housed 
markets. 


money  borrowed,  and  1  per  cent,  for  sinking  fund 
to  extinguish  the  principal  of  the  debt.  Thus,  while 
the  establishments  are  fully  self-sustaining,  they  are 
not  permitted  to  earn  any  monopoly  profits.  The 
number  of  beeves,  sheep,  hogs,  etc.,  slaughtered  an- 
nually under  Berlin  municipal  auspices,  approaches 
two  million.  The  service  is  rendered  more  cheaply 
than  under  the  old  system,  and  the  consumers  of  meat 
have  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  every  health 
condition  is  fully  regarded.  The  public  inspectors 
pass  upon  the  live  animals,  and  further  examine  the 
dressed  meat.  The  inspection  service  is  very  highly 
organized,  and  it  is  of  course  an  immense  advantage, 
—  for  thorough  health  measures, —  to  have  all  the 
animal  food-supply  of  the  city  pass,  compulsorily, 
through  municipal  establishments.  Not  to  enumerate 
other  cities,  it  is  sufficient  to  add  that  a  like  system 
of  exclusive  municipal  abattoirs  and  cattle-markets 
is  now  the  rule  rather  than  the  exception  in  the  lead- 
ing towns  of  Germany,  and  that  it  is  by  no  means 
confined  to  the  largest  places.  The  Berlin  cattle- 
market,  unlike  the  slaughter-houses,  is  allowed  to 
earn  profits ;  and  it  easily  pays  a  net  sum  of  half  a 
million  marks  a  year  into  the  city  treasury. 

So  much  for  the  meat-supply.  But  it  is  also  the 
German  policy  to  bring  under  official  oversight  so  far 
as  possible  all  other  articles  of  ordinary  food- con- 
sumption. To  this  end  the  ancient  custom  of  open 
public  market-places  is  just  now  becoming  metamor- 
phosed into  a  marvelous  modern  system  of  vast  mu- 
nicipal market-halls,  erected  in  the  populous  quarters 
of  the  greater  cities,  and  at  the  convenient  central 
point  in  smaller  places.  Berlin  has  of  late  been  add- 
ing rapidly  to  the  number  of  its  housed  markets,  and 
its  debt  on  account  of  the  recent  cost  of  laud  and 
buildings  for  this  one  purpose  has  reached  about 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  365 

25,000,000  marks.     The  value  of  the  total  invest-     CHAP.  vi. 
ment  is  considerably  greater  than  the  outstanding  r 

J     °  3    Berlin's  mar- 

bonded  indebtedness.     It  is  the  policy  of  the  market-    ket  policy. 

hall  administration  to  rent  staDs  and  stands  on  a  purely 
commercial  basis,  and  to  make  the  business  profitable. 
The  markets  are  on  an  admirable  financial  footing, 
and  already  help  to  lighten  rather  than  to  increase 
the  burdens  of  the  general  city  treasury. 

The  existing  Berlin  system  comprises  fourteen  of 
these  great  provision-markets.  Their  advantages  in 
aiding  the  work  of  food  inspection,  and  in  the  protec- 
tion of  the  poor  against  unwholesome  food  of  all 
sorts,  as  well  as  against  extortionate  prices,  are  too 
obvious  to  need  any  exposition.  How  recently  Ber- 
lin's policy  in  this  direction  has  been  initiated  will  be  dertakmg. 
apparent  when  I  explain  that  only  one  of  the  halls 
(the  so-called  "  Central ")  was  in  use  before  1886,  while 
the  next  seven  were  opened  in  that  and  the  two  fol- 
lowing years.  The  remaining  six  have  been  opened, 
or  their  construction  has  begun,  since  1890. 

As  yet  the  municipal  cattle-markets  and  slaughter- 
houses are  more  general  in  German  cities  than  the 
great  market-halls;  but  the  plan  of  enclosed,  sys- 
tematic produce-markets  is  now  attracting  the  atten- 
tion of  numerous  municipalities.  What  the  French 
call  the  approvisionnement  of  a  city  population,  and 
what  the  Germans  call  the  Versorgung  der  BevolJcerung 
mit  Lebensmitteln, —  the  supply  of  the  population  with 
food, —  is  everywhere  on  the  European  continent  a 
subject  of  constantly  increasing  municipal  concern  oversight 

T    .  ,          .  of  food 

and  intervention.    And  quite  generally  the  plan  of     supplies 
publicly-owned  cattle-markets,  abattoirs,  and  whole-    goodamum- 
sale  and  retail  vegetable  and  provision  markets  has 
come  into  favor,  together  with  thoroughgoing  sys- 
tems of  food  inspection,  which  include, —  besides  the 
expert  examining  corps  that  serve  in  the  market- 


366 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  vi.  places  and  go  from  shop  to  shop, —  the  most  perfectly 
equipped  chemical,  physical,  and  bacteriological  lab- 
oratories. There  is  perhaps  no  function  that  the 
German  cities  would  more  unanimously  consider  as 
belonging  within  the  sphere  of  good  municipal  house- 
keeping than  the  anxious  and  aggressive  oversight  of 
the  food-supply.  This  is  a  service  that  the  private 
family,  especially  the  poor  family,  cannot  possibly 
secure  on  its  own  account.  It  is  therefore  proper 
that  the  authorities  should  intervene. 


Organization 
of  charity. 


Uniform  in 
Germany. 


The  Berlin 
system. 


Citizen  mem- 
bers of  local 
boards. 


For  the  care  of  the  poor  and  the  relief  of  all  forms 
of  distress,  whether  temporary  or  permanent,  the 
German  cities  are  superbly  organized.  The  policy 
under  which  relief  is  administered  has  the  advantage 
of  being  a  national  and  uniform  one.  Thus,  while 
the  practical  working  of  the  policy  belongs  to  the 
municipal  administration,  there  is  perfect  harmony 
of  method  not  only  throughout  Prussia  but  also 
throughout  the  whole  German  empire  with  the  ex- 
ception of  Bavaria  and  Alsace-Lorraine.  Let  us 
glance  at  the  organization  of  Berlin,  for  example,  as 
a  typical  city.  There  is  a  strong  central  department 
of  the  city  government  with  a  magistrate  at  its  head 
and  with  competent  specialists  and  general  advisers 
attached  to  it.  But  the  practical  work  of  relief  is 
administered  by  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  local 
committees,  the  city  being  divided  for  purposes  of 
poor  relief  into  that  number  of  districts.  Each  dis- 
trict committee  has  attached  to  it  ex-officio  a  member 
of  the  municipal  council,  and  a  physician  who  has 
been  appointed  as  the  regular  city  physician  for  that 
neighborhood.  In  addition  to  these  officers  the  local 
committee  contains  from  five  to  twelve  citizens  who 
reside  in  the  district  and  who  have  been  appointed 
on  the  ground  of  character  and  trustworthiness. 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


367 


To  be  designated  a  member  of  one  of  these  local 
committees  for  the  relief  of  the  poor  is  regarded  as  a 
mark  of  respect  and  is  esteemed  a  substantial  honor. 
It  shows  that  a  man  has  good  standing  with  his 
neighbors,  and  also  that  he  possesses  the  confidence 
and  regard  of  the  ruling  authorities  of  Berlin.  No 
man  would  dream  of  refusing  to  serve  on  such  a 
committee.  It  is  held  to  be  one  of  the  most  sacred 
duties  of  citizenship.  Moreover,  the  acceptance  of 
the  trust  is  obligatory,  refusal  carrying  with  it  the 
penalty  of  increased  taxes  and,  under  certain  circum- 
stances, a  suspension  of  civil  and  political  privileges. 
No  remuneration  is  attached  to  these  appointments, 
and  the  duties  connected  with  them  are  far  from 
nominal  and  may  not  be  shirked.  Each  district  is 
subdivided  so  that  every  citizen-member  of  the  local 
committee  is  made  responsible  for  a  certain  number 
of  families  and  houses.  He  is  expected  to  know  the 
condition  of  his  little  parish.  He  is  fully  authorized 
to  administer  prompt  relief  in  pressing  cases,  and  is 
under  obligation  to  examine  thoroughly  into  all 
cases  which  require  continued  assistance.  The  entire 
local  committee  assembles  at  regular  times  for  full 
report  and  discussion  upon  the  condition  of  the  dis- 
trict ;  and  reports  are  carried  to  the  central  municipal 
office  from  all  the  neighborhoods.  Every  new  mem- 
ber of  the  local  committee  is  carefully  instructed  as 
to  the  scope  of  his  duties  and  the  range  of  his  dis- 
cretion, and  inasmuch  as  appointments  are  made  with 
great  care  the  average  of  efficiency  among  these  visi- 
tors is  very  high  indeed.  There  are  between  two  and 
three  thousand  citizens  who  thus  serve  the  Berlin 
municipality  in  conjunction  with  the  regularly  sala- 
ried officials.  Many  of  them  have  acted  in  this  capa- 
city, as  friend,  neighbor,  and  helper  of  the  poor,  for 
a  long  period  of  years.  Every  householder  fully  un- 


CHAP.  VI. 


Service  an 

honor  and  a 

duty. 


Minute 
responsibil- 
ities. 


Efficiency  of 
system. 


368  MUNICIPAL  GOVEBNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  vi.  derstands  the  system,  and  every  family  in  distress 
knows  exactly  to  whom  to  apply  for  relief.  The 
whole  system  rests  upon  the  principle  that  the  com- 

The  family    munity  is  a  great  family,  which  is  bound  to  intervene 

principle.  ^  tue  prompt  heip  of  those  who  are  rendered  unable 
through  misfortune  to  help  themselves ;  and  there  is 
no  loss  of  self-respect  involved  in  accepting  aid  at 
the  hands  of  a  permanent  local  committee  made  up 
of  good-samaritan  neighbors.  Each  committee  has 
at  hand  every  needed  appliance  for  the  prompt  sum- 
moning of  assistance,  medical  and  otherwise.  The 
organization  is  so  complete  as  to  make  cases  of  fraud 
practically  impossible,  and  duplication  of  relief  is  a 
thing  of  the  past  in  Germany. 

This  system  combines  in  a  single  permanent  and 

harmonious  organization  all  the  good  features  that 

one  finds  in  our  Associated  Charity  societies,  citizens' 

relief  committees,  and  public  departments  for  the  care 

AS  in  Berlin,  of  the  poor.     The  description  I  have  given  of  the  Ber- 

cities.       lin  organization  would  apply  equally  well  to  Hamburg, 

Frankf  ort-on-the-Main,  Breslau,  Dresden,  Leipsic,  and, 

in  fact,  to  nearly  all  the  cities,  great  and  small,  of  all 

•  th     portions  of  Germany.     An  analogous  system  exists  in 

country,  the  country  districts,  and  very  interesting  provisions 
for  the  regulation  of  vagrancy  give  the  authorities  a 

Vagrants     perfect  control  over  the  floating  population.     Berlin 

and  lodging-    f-  •  a  •    •       i    i    ;j     •         i,  j 

houses.      has  a  good  service  of  municipal  lodging-houses  and 
workhouses  which  enables  it  to  make  humane  and 
salutary  disposition  of  the  drifting  and  homeless  ele- 
ment from  which  no  great  city  is  ever  wholly  free. 
IAbor       Most  of  the  large  cities  have  also  lately  adopted  the 
colonies,     plan  of  labor  colonies,  established  on  municipal  farms, 
for  the  benefit  of  certain  classes  of  unfortunate  citi- 
zens.    The  eminent  success  of  the  German  cities  in 
Thousands    bringing  thousands  upon  thousands  of  the  best  citi- 
zens  into  permanent  and  active  service  in  connection 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  369 

with  the  administration  of  poor-relief,  is  not  to  be  for-    CHAP.  vi. 
gotten  when  one  is  inclined  to  criticize  German  admin- 
istration as  perfunctory  and  mechanical  on  account 
of  the  high  development  of  routine  officialism  and 
bureaucracy. 

Germany  has  not  been  satisfied,  however,  with  the 
establishment  of  a  more  satisfactory  method  of  poor 
relief  than  any  other  country  has  put  into  practice. 
It  has  seemed  to  German  administrators  and  philan-  against  sick- 
thropists  that  the  whole  modern  plan  of  public  alms  oid8age. 
ought  to  be  superseded  by  a  system  of  publicly  man- 
aged insurance,  to  provide  against  sickness,  accidents, 
permanent  invalidism,  and  the  feebleness  of  old  age, — 
a  system  aiming  at  nothing  less  than  the  ultimate 
abolition  of  poverty.  Toward  this  ideal  the  Germans 
have  been  very  bravely  and  creditably  making  their 
way  for  some  years.  The  business  of  insurance 
against  sickness  has  now  for  a  decade  or  more  been 
carried  on  by  numerous  German  municipalities,  in 
order  to  supplement  the  various  relief  funds  of  the  Mutual 
trades-unions,  and  those  of  the  volunteer  benefit  asso-  societies. 
ciations  existing  in  the  different  wards  and  localities 
of  all  the  larger  German  towns.  It  has  been  the  policy 
both  of  the  general  government  and  also  of  the  muni- 
cipal authorities  to  encourage  and  protect  in  every 
way  the  formation  of  these  neighborhood  and  trade 
societies  for  insurance  against  illness  or  accident. 
They  are  all  carefully  registered  and  supervised ;  and 
thus  the  public  authorities  know  precisely  to  what  ex- 
tent these  voluntary  agencies  meet  the  needs  of  a 
given  community. 

The  system,  as  a  whole,  whether  municipal  or  oth- 
wise,  has  had  very  great  development  throughout 
Germany;  and  at  length  the  German  empire  has 
added  the  crowning  touch  by  enacting  a  law  for  the 
insurance  of  the  working  classes  against  the  helpless- 

24 


370  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vi.    ness  of  old  age.     I  shall  enter  upon  no  discussion  of 

this  controverted  topic  of  old-age  pensions.     It  is 

Thequestion  quite  too  soon  as  yet  to  "judge  of  the  results  of  such 

of  old  age        *  .  J  «        ° 

pensions,  insurance  in  the  German  cities.  I  may  merely  remark 
that  the  practical  administration  of  this  system  has 
for  the  most  part  been  put  into  the  hands  of  munici- 
pal and  local  governments ;  and  that  the  cities  of  Ger- 
many, great  and  small,  are  now,  in  addition  to  their 
many  other  functions,  carrying  on  or  closely  super- 
vising, for  the  benefit  of  the  masses  of  working-people, 
the  business  of  insurance  against  sickness,  accident, 
invalidism,  and  old  age.  All  this  must  seem  to  most 
Americans  a  novel  if  not  a  dangerous  line  of  innova- 
tion. And  yet  it  grows  logically  and  naturally  out 
of  the  German  doctrine  of  the  responsibility  of  the 

socialism  community  f  or  the  popular  well-being.  The  objection 
relief.  is  raised  in  many  quarters  that  this  is  socialism.  To 
which  I  can  only  reply  that  every  civilized  country, 
for  many  generations,  has  fully  acknowledged  the 
duty  and  necessity  of  some  form  of  public  poor-re- 
lief ;  and  in  some  countries,  as  in  England,  the  relief 
of  the  poor  has  been  the  heaviest  item  of  public  ex- 
penditure. The  funds  collected  by  taxation  and  dis- 
pensed for  the  sustenance  of  mendicants  and  paupers 
have  come  out  of  the  pockets  of  the  industrious  and 
fortunate  classes.  Recent  German  thinking  on  these 
subjects  has  been  along  the  line  of  enforced  thrift  to 
the  end  that  the  working  classes,  through  the  accu- 
mulation out  of  their  own  wages  of  funds  for  insur- 
ance against  various  contingencies,  may  in  time 
become  fully  self-sustaining,  and  may  thus  relieve 
other  classes  from  the  necessity  of  paying  heavy  taxes 
for  the  relief  of  misfortune  and  pauperism.  I  should 
wish  to  give  very  careful  study  to  the  subject  of  com- 
pulsory old-age  insurance  or  compulsory  sickness  or 
accident  insurance  before  advocating  any  such  sys- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


371 


CHAP.  VI. 


Municipal 
savings- 
banks. 


tern ;  but  it  requires  no  expert  knowledge  to  perceive 
that  old-fashioned  poor-relief  methods,  as  they  exist 
in  England  and  the  United  States,  are  more  socialistic 
than  the  modern  insurance  methods  long  advocated 
and  now  practised  in  Germany. 

Communities  which  would  go  so  far  as  to  inaugu- 
rate systems  for  the  compulsory  mutual  relief  through 
insurance  funds  of  their  masses  of  working-people, 
would  naturally  have  turned  their  attention  at  some 
earlier  time  to  the  encouragement  of  saving  and  to 
protection  from  the  extortion  of  usurers.  As  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  municipal  savings-banks  are  a  venerable 
institution  in  Germany,  and  are  to  be  found  almost 
without  exception  in  all  the  large  towns  of  the  em- 
pire. In  most  of  the  important  German  towns  the 
number  of  depositors  in  the  publicly  managed  sav- 
ings-banks considerably  exceeds  the  whole  number  of 
families  in  the  town.  This  is  now  true  as  regards 

-r,      , .  T  ...         ,-.         ,  ..  .  Number  of 

Berlin.  In  some  cities  the  depositors  are  twice  as  depositors. 
numerous  as  the  households.  The  rules  and  methods 
of  municipal  savings-banks  differ  considerably  in 
matters  of  detail.  Most  of  them  pay  a  yearly  interest 
of  about  three  per  cent.  The  convenience  of  deposi- 
tors is  served  in  the  larger  places  by  the  maintenance 
of  a  great  number  of  branch  offices  scattered  through 
the  different  wards  and  neighborhoods.  Thus  the 
Berlin  savings-bank  system  has  seventy-five  or  more 
receiving  offices,  and  the  Hamburg  system  has  about 
forty.  Berlin  has  more  than  400,000  depositors,  with 
total  deposits  approaching  150,000,000  marks.  The 
Hamburg  deposits  had  passed  the  100,000,000  point 
several  years  ago,  and  were  rapidly  growing  in  volume. 
Dresden  makes  the  remarkable  showing  of  nearly 
200,000  outstanding  depositors'  books,  with  total  de- 
posits well  exceeding  50,000,000  marks.  Leipsic,  Mag- 


Statistics 

from  various 

cities. 


372 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Financial 
policy. 


CHAP.  vi.  deburg,  Frankf  ort-on-the-Main,  Hanover,  Kouigsberg, 
and  Diisseldorf  carry,  in  proportion  to  their  popula- 
tion, marvelously  large  sums  iii  the  municipal  savings- 
banks,  distributed  among  very  great  numbers  of  de- 
positors. Altona  and  Bremen  show  statistics  almost 

instances.6  incredible  j  and  it  would  seem  that  in  Aachen  (Aix- 
la-Chapelle)  almost  every  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the 
city  holds  a  bank-book.  At  the  beginning  of  the  year 
1890  105,000  savings-bank  books  were  outstanding  in 
Aachen,  with  credits  against  the  municipal  sparkasse 
(savings-fund)  of  more  than  75,000,000  marks.  The 
banks  are  administered  by  the  public  authorities  at 
a  minimum  of  expense.  Their  funds  are  invested, 
as  a  rule,  in  imperial,  national,  or  municipal  interest- 
bearing  securities.  It  is  the  universal  policy  to  pay 
as  high  a  rate  as  possible  to  the  depositors,  and  to 
make  the  savings-bank  department  barely  self-sustain- 
ing. In  order  that  the  advantages  of  savings-banks 
may  be  practically  restricted  to  the  classes  for  whose 
benefit  they  were  founded,  a  limit  is  in  most  cities, — 
though  not  in  all, —  fixed  upon  the  amount  that  will 
be  received  to  the  credit  of  any  one  depositor. 

Municipal  pawnshops  (leihhauser)  are  quite  as  gen- 
eral in  the  German  cities  as  the  municipal  savings- 
banks,  and  some  of  them  are  very  old.  Thus  the 
public  loan-office  of  Augsburg  dates  from  the  year 
pawn-shops.  1601,  Nuremberg's  was  founded  in  1618,  and  Ham- 
burg's in  1650.  Those  of  Dresden,  Munich,  Breslau, 
Frankfort-on-the-Main,  and  several  smaller  cities  are 
now  more  than  a  hundred  years  old.  Berlin's  was 
established  more  than  sixty  years  ago.  Leipsic  and 
Cologne  began  the  business  early  in  this  century,  as 
did  Strassburg  and  a  dozen  other  cities.  On  the  other 
hand,  a  considerable  number  of  the  rapidly  growing 
industrial  centers  of  Germany  have  established  mu- 
nicipal pawnshops  as  a  part  of  the  new  municipal 


Public 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


373 


activities  of  the  past  ten  or  fifteen  years.  Experience 
has  fully  satisfied  the  German  cities  as  to  the  feasibil- 
ity, and  the  practical  benefits  to  the  poor,  of  an  as- 
sumption by  the  municipality  itself  of  the  function  of 
loan  agent.  The  rules  and  methods  in  vogue  have 
been  worked  out  by  long  experience,  and  are  worthy  of 
the  attention  of  other  countries.  The  more  common 
rate  charged  to  borrowers  is  2  percent,  a  month  on  small 
loans,  and  1  per  cent,  a  month  on  sums  above  about 
thirty  marks  (seven  or  eight  dollars) ;  but  in  some 
German  cities  the  rates  are  considerably  lower.  Be- 
tween the  lines  of  the  statistical  columns  in  official 
reports  which  show  the  number  and  amounts  of  loans 
made  on  pledges  of  personal  and  household  effects 
from  year  to  year,  one  can  with  very  little  imagina- 
tion read  whole  chapters  descriptive  of  good  service 
rendered  to  the  poor  in  times  of  emergency,  and  of 
public  protection  against  the  class  of  sharks  who  in 
our  American  cities  prey  almost  unrestrictedly  upon 
the  distress  of  the  tenement-house  population. 

If  I  were  attempting  an  exhaustive  topical  treat- 
ment of  the  working  functions  of  German  city  gov- 
ernments, I  should  still  have  to  enumerate  several 
interesting  lines  of  activity.  I  have  said  nothing  of 
the  organization  of  fire  departments;  nor  have  I 
spoken  of  house  insurance  against  fire,  although  this 
is  one  of  Berlin's  departments  of  municipal  house- 
keeping. Upon  the  important  question  of  parks  and 
open  spaces,  I  may  only  say  that  the  strong  movement 
everywhere  now  observable  in  Germany  toward  the 
provision  of  air,  light,  and  space,  toward  the  exten- 
sion of  municipal  areas,  and  toward  the  relief  of  con- 
gestion in  central  districts,  fully  recognizes  as  a  part 
of  its  practical  program  the  necessity  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  numerous  small  parks,  playgrounds,  and 
breathing-spaces.  A  great  number  of  the  German 


CHAP.  VI. 


Rules  and 
methods. 


Social 
Tjenefits. 


Fire  depart- 
ments and 
fire-insur- 
ance. 


Parks  and 
open  spaces. 


24* 


374 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI 


Number  of 

small  parks 

and  public 

gardens  in 

different 

towns. 


Recreation 

and  physical 

culture. 


Public 

duty  toward 

the  child. 


cities  and  towns  were  in  their  medieval  days  sur- 
rounded by  walls,  moats  and  glacis  belts ;  and  these 
have  in  modern  times  been  transformed  into  broad 
tree-lined  boulevards  and  public  gardens.  And  the 
recent  expansion  of  these  towns  has  left  the  ring  of 
boulevards  and  park-spaces  well  toward  the  heart  of 
the  municipality,  to  the  inestimable  benefit  of  the 
population.  Most  of  the  municipal  parks,  squares, 
gardens,  and  playgrounds  of  German  cities  are  small, 
but  they  are  quite  numerous  and  well-distributed. 
Berlin  has  about  eighty,  Hamburg  has  more  than 
sixty,  Munich  forty-four,  Dresden  thirty-five,  Cologne 
thirty-two,  Nuremberg  thirty-one,  Breslau  twenty- 
eight,  Frankfort  twenty-five,  Chemnitz  twenty-four, 
Stuttgart  nineteen,  Leipsic  eighteen,  and  so  on.  I 
should  be  glad  to  devote  some  space  to  the  varied 
means  employed  by  German  cities  for  the  encourage- 
ment of  harmless  recreation  and  for  the  promotion 
of  physical  culture.  But  it  is  enough  to  say  that  the 
German  municipality,  with  its  conception  of  respon- 
sibility for  the  sum  total  of  the  well-being  of  its 
people,  does  not  disregard  the  fact  that  recreation  is 
a  necessity,  and  that  in  crowded  cities  the  subject  is 
one  not  to  be  left  wholly  to  personal  choice  or  private 
management. 

In  conclusion  I  have  but  to  mention  briefly  the 
manner  in  which  the  German  municipalities  are  re- 
sponding to  the  most  serious  of  all  the  responsibilities 
that  they  recognize.  The  conception  now  entertained 
in  Germany  of  the  community's  duty  toward  the 
child,  is  a  broader  one  than  that  which  prevails  in 
our  American  cities.  The  struggle  for  existence  is 
more  difficult  in  Germany  than  in  America,  though 
perhaps  not  harsher  and  probably  less  fiercely  compe- 
titive. But  at  any  rate  the  connection  between  edu- 


THE  GERMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS 


375 


cation  and  ability  to  earn  a  livelihood  is  far  more 
intimate  in  Germany  than  here.  Every  thoughtful 
man  in  the  empire  has  recognized  the  fact  that  the 
industrial  and  commercial  as  well  as  the  military  and 
political  future  of  Germany  depend  upon  the  uni- 
versality of  the  best  kind  of  education.  The  German 
cities  have  been  trying  to  make  their  school  systems 
fit  the  necessities  of  their  population.  They  have 
made  elementary  education  universal  and  compul- 
sory. They  have  introduced  much  manual  training 
and  physical  culture  into  their  school  courses,  and  are 
many  years  in  advance  of  our  American  cities  in 
adapting  the  quality  of  instruction  to  the  practical 
ends  that  common-school  education  ought  to  serve. 
In  addition,  they  have  amply  provided  for  the  higher 
education, —  showing  a  preference,  however,  for  schools 
which  will  furnish  Germany  with  an  abundant  sup- 
ply of  men  of  special  and  technical  training.  Manu- 
facturing cities  like  Chemnitz  promote  the  develop- 
ment of  their  principal  industries  by  providing  trade 
schools  which  are  adapted  in  their  courses  to  the  in- 
dustrial character  of  the  city  or  vicinity.  The  fresh 
and  practical  character  of  popular  education  in  Ger- 
man cities  owes  very  much  to  the  fact  that  —  in  ad- 
dition to  the  permanent  school  officials  who  supervise 
the  entire  educational  system  of  any  given  municipal- 
ity—  there  are  numerous  local  school  boards  upon 
which  a  great  number  of  competent  citizens  are  asked 
to  serve.  This  service  is  required  upon  principles 
similar  to  those  which  call  citizens  of  character  to  the 
work  of  administering  poor-relief.  Thus  in  Berlin 
there  are  some  thousands  of  reputable  citizens  who 
are  responsibly  and  intimately  connected  with  the 
city's  educational  system.  Here  again  we  find  a  safe- 
guard against  the  mechanical  and  perfunctory  ten- 
dencies of  routine  officialism.  I  am  sure  that,  so  far 


CHAP.  VI. 


Education 
and  liveli- 
hood. 


Special  and 
technical 
.  training. 


Citizens 
on  school- 
boards. 


376 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VI. 


Municipal 
tax-paying. 


What  the 
tax-payer 
receives. 


What  the 
municipal 
indebted- 
ness means. 


as  elementary  education  is  concerned,  our  American 
cities  have  more  to  learn  from  the  methods  and  results 
attained  by  the  German  cities  than  we  have  to  teach 
them.  Our  progress  must  be  along  their  paths. 

The  German  citizen  is  a  heavy  tax-payer.  Even  if 
he  were  relieved  from  the  great  burden  of  imperial 
and  State  taxation  which  military  exigencies  impose 
upon  him,  his  dues  to  the  municipal  government 
alone  would  be  formidable  enough.  Land  and  houses 
are  heavily  taxed ;  the  income  tax  is  resorted  to  for 
municipal  as  well  as  for  State  revenue ;  and  the  whole 
population  is  made  to  contribute  in  various  ways, — 
through  indirect  imposts  upon  articles  of  common 
necessity  if  not  through  direct  taxes, —  toward  the 
cost  of  these  highly-developed  municipal  organisms. 
Everywhere  and  always  taxation  in  any  form  seems 
a  grievance ;  and  it  is  not  strange  that  the  German 
tax-payer  should  groan.  But  the  other  side  of  the 
picture  is  not  unpleasant.  The  German  tax-payer 
finds  every  pfennig  of  his  money  well  accounted  for. 
He  sees  everywhere  about  him  the  beneficent  results 
of  public  expenditure  carefully  and  wisely  made.  He 
perceives  that  through  his  membership  in  a  municipal 
household  which  makes  itself  responsible  for  the  well- 
being  of  the  whole  community,  he  is  receiving  bene- 
fits which,  upon  the  average,  are  inestimably  more 
valuable  than  any  that  he  could  have  purchased  for 
himself  with  the  money  he  has  had  to  contribute  to 
meet  the  municipality's  housekeeping  bills.  He  is  in 
no  wise  appalled  by  the  nominal  fact  of  large  muni- 
cipal indebtedness,  because  he  perceives  that  almost 
the  entire  total  amount  of  the  municipality's  obliga- 
tions is  represented  by  investment  in  productive  en- 
terprises. And  these  earning  departments  promise 
not  only  to  pay  their  own  way  and  repay  all  that 
they  cost,  but  also  give  assurance  of  increasing  prof- 


THE  GEKMAN  CITY,— ITS  FUNCTIONS  377 

its  which  may  be  confidently  expected  to  liquidate  CHAP.  vi. 
much  of  the  public  indebtedness  incurred  on  account 
of  such  non-productive  services  as  that  of  free  ele- 
mentary education.  The  German  cities  possess  tan- 
gible municipal  property  worth  at  market  prices  far 
more  than  their  outstanding  bonded  indebtedness. 
Their  financial  position  is  absolutely  unassailable.  The 
For  their  indebtedness  they  have  much  to  exhibit, 
Their  interest-bearing  obligations  represent  foresight, 
enterprise,  business  shrewdness,  brilliant  investment, 
permanent  progress  in  sanitary  appliances,  and  a  lift- 
ing of  the  standards  of  civilized  life.  Before  criti- 
cizing the  German  municipal  methods  too  severely,  we 
might  well  analyze  our  American  city  debts  in  order 
to  ascertain  what  investments  they  represent,  and 
what  testimony  they  have  to  bear  concerning  the 
thrift,  foresight,  and  wise  intelligence  that  have  con- 
trolled our  American  municipal  financiering  in  the 
past  twenty-five  years. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  FREE  CITY  OF   HAMBURG  AND  ITS 
SANITARY   REFORMS 


THE   German  cities  in  their  municipal  activities 
have  not  until  late  years  been  largely  impelled 
by  the  sanitary  motive.     They  have  done  wonderful 
things,  and  have  shown  a  splendid  capacity  and  busi- 
ness thrift.     But  while  the  public  health  has  been  the 
The  sanitary  dominant  motive  in  the  development  of  the  municipal 
mwicipai    furious  of  Glasgow  and  some  other  of  the  British 
activities,     cities,  good  financial  results  have  seemed  to  be  the 
chief  criterion  of  success  in  German  municipal  gov- 
ernment.    The  broad  generalization  is  too  sweeping, 
yet  it  is  upon  the  whole  a  defensible  one.    "While  tak- 
ing the  lead  of  all  nations  in  the  scientific  study  of 
the  problems  of  the  public  health,  the  Germans  have 
not  been  the  most  eager  people  in  the  world  to  spend 
millions  of  money  in  the  application  of  hygienic  prin- 
ciples.    Fortunately  for  them,  they  have  the  best  sci- 
entific leadership  that  any  country  can  boast,  and  at 
the  same  time1  they  have  by  far  the  best  administra- 
tive mechanism.     All  that  had  been  needed,  therefore, 
was  the  motive  strong  enough  to  open  wide  the  public 
its  awaken-   purse-strings.    The  last  cholera  epidemic  appears  now 
many.      to  have  supplied  it.    All  over  Germany  the  learned 
doctors  and  bacteriologists  have  since  1892  been  dic- 
tating terms  to  the  awakened  municipal  authorities. 

The  experience  of  1893  made  it  seem  probable  that 
the  cholera  could  never  again  prevail  in  uncontrol- 

378 


HAMBUEG  AND  ITS  SANITAEY  EEFOEMS  379 

lable  epidemic  form  in  western  Europe  or  America.  CHAP.  vn. 
The  kindred  sciences  of  bacteriological  medicine  and  conquest  of 
public  sanitation  have,  in  these  last  years,  grappled  ^is^l.™' 
most  brilliantly  and  effectively  with  the  dreaded  mon- 
ster. Berlin,  Paris,  London,  and  New  York  have 
learned  that  they  can  hold  the  cholera  firmly  in  check. 
And  now  the  cities  that  have  suffered  most  in  recent 
years,  such  as  Naples  and  Hamburg,  are  prepared  to 
meet  the  scourge  on  its  appearance,  and  prevent  it 
from  becoming  widely  epidemic  or  from  interfering 
seriously  with  business.  The  unspeakable  fright, 
therefore,  which  has  heretofore  attended  the  outbreak 
of  cholera  in  western  Europe  and  America  is  likely  to 
pass  away  with  the  present  decade ;  so  that  a  sporadic 
case  now  and  then  will  have  no  paralyzing  effect 
upon  the  environing  community. 

It  is  clearly  fortunate,  however,  that  Europe  should 
have  suffered  these  recent  pangs  of  awful  fear.     The 
cholera  is  a  sensational  disease.    Other  maladies,  pre-  cholera  as  a 
ventable  to  a  large  extent  by  public  hygienic  mea- 


sures, are  far  more  destructive  of  lif e  than  the  cholera. 
But  their  ravages  are  more  insidious  and  more  com- 
monplace; and  the  warning  cry  of  sanitary  science 
acts  tardily  and  feebly  upon  municipal  purse-strings. 
A  high  average  death-rate,  due  to  bad  sanitary  con- 
ditions, is  not  ordinarily  seen  to  disturb  the  course  of 
trade,  or  to  lessen  greatly  the  life-chances  of  the  burgh- 
ers who  pay  the  heavy  taxes  and  control  the  public 
funds.  But  a  cholera  epidemic  ruins  business,  im- 
poverishes the  comfortable  burghers,  and  threatens  to 
invade  their  domiciles  and  rob  them  of  their  first-born.  Effects  of  a 
It  acts  as  the  effective  tenth  plague,  and  the  municipal 
Pharaoh  bestirs  himself  mightily.  Naples  had  long 
intended,  in  a  languid  way,  to  reform  its  sanitary  ar- 
rangements, but  not  until  the  cholera  epidemic  of 
1885  supplied  the  motive  force  was  anything  of  much 


380  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vii.  importance  undertaken.  The  improvements  set  on 
foot  as  a  result  of  that  epidemic  have  revolutionized 
the  city,  and  will  have  resulted  in  the  saving  of  many 
thousands  of  lives  every  year ;  for  the  principal  effect 
of  efforts  to  guard  against  cholera  is  to  abolish,  or 
greatly  diminish,  mortality  from  various  other  causes, 
itaiy.  That  epidemic  at  Naples  led,  further,  to  the  enact- 
ment of  a  new  sanitary  code  for  the  Italian  kingdom, 
and  to  many  excellent  improvements  in  other  Ital- 
ian cities  and  towns  besides  Naples.  Far  more  wide- 
spread throughout  Europe,  however,  will  have  been 
the  improved  sanitary  arrangements  resulting  from 

in  Germany,  the  cholera  invasion  of  1892-93.  And  it  is  in  Ger- 
many, doubtless,  that  the  most  important  effects  will 
appear. 

Germany's  progress  in  the  health  administration  of 
cities  is  well  illustrated  in  the  reforms  which  have  re- 
cently been  accomplished  at  Hamburg.  Between  the 
years  1831  and  1873,  Hamburg  had  suffered  from  four- 
teen visitations  of  the  cholera.  In  1892  it  experienced 
a  terrible  cholera  epidemic,  but  its  new  health  methods 

Mw^nitery  &ve  g°0(l  promise  of  future  immunity.     I  propose, 

mtypiclsi as  therefore,  in  this  chapter  to  describe  Hamburg's  sani- 
tary work  somewhat  in  detail,  as  typical  of  the  new 
national  spirit  and  policy.  For  it  is  to  Germany 
more  than  to  any  other  country  that  the  world  is  in- 
debted for  the  most  important  new  lessons  not  only 
in  sanitary  science,  but  also  in  the  practical  applica- 
tions of  new  hygienic  knowledge  to  the  organized  work 
of  municipal  government.  There  is  very  much  in 
Hamburg's  conditions  and  in  its  sanitary  plans  and  un- 
dertakings that  ought  to  interest  the  intelligent  people 
and  the  officials  of  our  American  cities.  But  it  may 
also  be  well  by  way  of  some  prefatory  paragraphs  to 
give  an  outline  sketch  of  Hamburg's  general  muni- 
cipal character  and  governmental  structure.  Some 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS  381 

aspects  of  the  political  organization  of  this  great  sea-    CHAP.  vu. 
port,  Germany's  second  city,  are  hardly  less  worthy  of 
attention  than  its  improved  health  services. 

Let  it  be  said  that  Hamburg  was  most  unjustly 
treated  by  the  major  part  of  the  American  press  dur- 
ing the  summer  and  autumn  of  1892,  and  that  most 
Americans  retain  an  entirely  erroneous  impression 
concerning  the  city.  Until  late  years  it  has  been  ap- 
preciatively known  by  comparatively  few  American 
visitors.  Even  the  travelers  who  patronize  the  fine 
steamers  of  the  Hamburg- American  Company  hurry 
on  to  Berlin,  and  learn  nothing  of  this  noble  old  Free 
Hansa  town  and  magnificent  port.  In  America  it  has 
been  chiefly  known  as  the  place  from  which  so  many 
undesirable  emigrants  take  shipping,  and  perhaps  for 
that  reason  it  has  gained  the  reputation  of  being  inde- 
scribably filthy,  overcrowded,  ugly,  and  uninterest- 
ing—  a  place,  in  short,  to  be  avoided.  No  impression 
could  be  further  from  the  truth.  The  emigrants  go 
from  Hamburg  for  the  same  reason  that  they  land  at  Hamburg's 
New  York :  the  one,  like  the  other,  is  without  rival  as  character. 
the  greatest  port  of  its  continent.  Ships  go  every- 
where from  Hamburg.  Its  dock  and  harbor  arrange- 
ments excite  the  enthusiastic  admiration  of  every  in- 
telligent visitor.  There  is  no  such  sight  elsewhere 
in  the  world.  The  Liverpool  arrangements  are  far  in- 
ferior. Within  a  few  years  there  has  been  expended 
by  the  German  Empire  and  the  city  of  Hamburg  a 
sum  approaching  $40,000,000  in  the  construction  of  this 
vast  shipping  terminal,  the  modern  conveniences  of 
which  make  everything  along  the  New  York  docks 
seem  absurdly  effete  and  obsolete. 

Hamburg  is  externally  a  more  attractive  and  pic-  Hamburg  as 
turesque  city  than  Berlin.     The  dull  and  somewhat  an  a"^tive 
cheap  monotony  of  the  huge  new  imperial  capital  is 
almost  painful  after  a  few  days  of  Hamburg's  variety 


382 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


Its  streets 
and  prome- 
nades. 


Position  as  a 
city-state. 


and  charm.  The  city's  architecture  combines  the 
modern  with  the  medieval  in  the  most  delightfully 
unexpected  ways.  Many  whole  streets  of  the  high- 
gabled,  timber-framed,  quaint-windowed  houses  of 
the  old  sixteenth-  and  seventeenth-century  Hanseatic 
merchants  remain  in  good  condition ;  and  yet  the  city 
as  a  whole  is  distinctly  modern  in  its  architecture.  A 
great  portion  of  its  central  area  was  swept  by  the 
historic  conflagration  of  May,  1842,  and  there  fol- 
lowed a  rebuilding  with  regularized  streets  and  mod- 
ern structures.  Far  from  being  hopelessly  congested 
and  void  of  breathing-spaces,  there  are  a  number  of 
tree-lined  thoroughfares  much  broader  than  are  to  be 
found  in  leading  American  cities,  while  in  the  very 
heart  of  the  city  there  are  large  water  spaces  and 
park  areas,  with  extensive  girdling  promenades,  and 
every  facility  for  healthful  outdoor  recreation.  These 
pleasure-grounds  take  the  place  of  the  old  fortifica- 
tions that  had  occupied  a  wide  belt  about  the  inner 
city.  A  dignified  and  splendid  city  is  Hamburg,  with 
its  600,000  inhabitants,  its  immense  commerce  with  all 
parts  of  the  world,  its  unusually  intelligent  merchant 
body,  its  suburbs  of  handsome  villas,  its  modern 
growth  and  enterprise,  and  its  fine  traditions  and 
history  that  bind  it  to  a  noble  past. 

Hamburg  holds  a  political  position  which  the  city 
of  New  York  might  well  envy.  It  is  a  city-state,  and 
it  has  a  government  exactly  adapted  to  its  conditions. 
There  is  no  meddlesome  provincial  government  or  de- 
partmental prefect  to  hold  the  Hamburg  administra- 
tion in  tutelage,  nor  any  separate  and  superior  national 
executive  or  parliament  to  order  its  police  affairs, 
supervise  its  finances,  or  legislate  touching  its  consti- 
tution or  any  of  its  chartered  powers.  Hamburg  is  a 
constituent  member  of  the  German  imperial  confed- 
eration, just  as  Rhode  Island  is  a  member  of  the  sis- 
terhood of  American  States.  And,  like  Rhode  Island, 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS  383 

it  is  for  domestic  purposes  a  sovereign  republic.    The    CHAP.  vn. 
citizen  of  Providence,  Rhode  Island,  however,  finds 
himself  subject  to  the  threefold  authority  of  a  muni- 
cipal government,  a  county  government,  and  a  State 
government.    His  municipal  affairs  are  constantly 
under  discussion  in  the  State  legislature,  which  at 
every  session  enacts  numerous  special  laws  dealing  with 
the  administration  of  Providence.    But  the  Hamburg    Ije^a}stare 
government  is  one  and  indivisible.    The  law-making     and  p^y 

0      council  are 

body  is  at  once  a  State  legislature  and  a  city  council,  identical. 
The  executive  organization  fits  the  circumstances  of 
a  city-state.  It  is  true  that  Hamburg  is  not  wholly 
urban.  Considered  as  a  state,  it  holds  a  domain  of 
158  square  miles, — an  area  slightly  smaller  than  that 
of  Chicago, —  while  Hamburg  considered  as  a  city 
comprises  (by  the  new  legislation  of  June,  1894)  7665  aM°city. e 
hectares,  or  30  square  miles.  But  whereas  the  city 
had  600,000  inhabitants  at  the  beginning  of  1895,  all 
the  rest  of  the  territory  possessed  only  50,000  (in  round 
figures),  a  large  part  of  whom  were  in  suburbs  adja- 
cent to  the  town.  The  domain  of  the  Hamburg  state 
is  not  all  contiguous,  a  part  of  it  lying  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Elbe  estuary,  about  75  miles  distant,  with 
Cuxhaven  as  its  port.  But  it  may  be  estimated  that 
a  hundred  or  more  square  miles,  or  two  thirds  of 
the  Hamburg  territory,  lie  on  the  north  bank  of 
the  Elbe  within  easy  reach  of  the  city,  and  consti- 
tute a  domain  about  equal  to  the  joint  contiguous 
areas  of  Minneapolis  and  St.  Paul.  The  outlying 
parts  (landbezirk)  are  grouped  in  four  landherrenschaf- 
ten,  or  districts  for  local  administrative  purposes,  and  tive  system. 
minor  rural  affairs  are  managed  by  a  further  subdi- 
vision into  nearly  forty  communes  or  petty  townships. 
But  the  main  interests  of  the  whole  area  belonging 
to  Hamburg  are  administered  and  controlled  by  the 
central  government,  which  also  administers  directly, 
on  its  own  behalf,  all  the  affairs  of  the  city. 


384 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


Concerning 
the  govern- 
ment in 
general. 


Hanseatic 
traditions. 


Membership 

and  election 

of  the"Bur- 

gersehaft." 


This  central  government  is  a  somewhat  complex 
structure,  yet  it  is  simple  enough  in  its  essential  fea- 
tures. In  the  broad  facts  of  a  large  elective  council 
and  a  permanent  executive  magistracy,  the  Hamburg 
government  is  analogous  to  those  of  other  German 
cities.  The  Hamburg  system  has  marks  of  its  own, 
however,  growing  out  of  the  many-centuried  and 
eventful  history  of  Hamburg  as  a  Free  City — a  lead- 
ing member  of  that  glorious  Hanseatic  League  which 
dominated  the  Baltic  and  North  Sea  commerce  of  the 
middle  ages,  and  which  led  in  the  struggle  against 
feudalism  of  those  new  forces,  gathering  in  the  com- 
mercial and  industrial  towns,  that  were  destined  to 
usher  in  the  modern  order  of  things.  Thus  Hamburg 
as  a  city-state  of  the  earlier  period,  when  cities  had  so 
distinct  a  part  to  play,  brings  down  to  our  new  period 
of  special  and  distinct  significance  for  great  towns 
much  of  its  tradition  of  municipal  greatness  and 
power,  and  much  transmitted  capacity  for  a  well- 
ordered  town  life. 

The  Free  and  Hansa  City  of  Hamburg  (Freie  und 
Hanse-Stadt  Hamburg],  as  the  republic  is  officially 
designated,  governs  itself  primarily  through  a  House 
of  Burgesses  (BUrgerschaft)  composed  of  160  mem- 
bers. Half  of  the  body,  80  members,  is  elected  by 
the  equal  suffrage  of  all  male  tax-paying  citizens. 
Since  taxes  are  due  from  everybody,  only  paupers 
or  floating  elements  of  population  are  disfranchised. 
The  other  half,  however,  is  not  so  popularly  elected. 
Forty  members  are  chosen  by  the  ballots  of  the 
house-owners  of  the  city  of  Hamburg,  and  40  by  a 
special  electorate  made  up  in  a  somewhat  elaborate 
fashion  of  judges  and  some  other  specified  dignitaries 
of  state,  and  of  the  members  of  certain  guilds  and 
corporate  bodies.  The  Biirgerschaft  as  a  whole  thus 
represents  the  general  citizenship  on  the  one  hand, 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS 


385 


and  the  property  and  commercial  interests  on  the 
other.  Hamburg  is  peculiarly  a  city  of  merchants; 
and  the  men  concerned  with  business  in  the  harbor 
or  in  the  Bourse  give  the  town  its  administrative 
character  and  policy,  and  wield  the  weightiest  influ- 
ence in  the  Biirgerschaft.  The  burgesses  are  elected 
for  six-year  terms,  and  half  of  the  body  is  renewed 
every  three  years.  Acceptance  and  service  are  re- 
quired by  law  of  those  whom  their  fellow  Hamburgers 
elect  to  the  Biirgerschaft. 

Executive  control  of  Hamburg's  affairs  is  vested  in 
a  body  of  eighteen  senators,  elected  for  life  by  the 
Biirgerschaft.  Nine  of  these  senators  must  have  been 
educated  either  as  lawyers  or  financiers, —  finance 
(cameralwissenschaft)  being  a  distinct  science  and 
profession  in  Germany.  Seven  of  the  remaining  nine 
must  belong  to  the  body  of  Hamburg  merchants 
(kaufmannschaft).  A  senator  may  not  decline  to 
accept  the  responsibility  if  chosen,  but  he  may  retire 
at  the  end  of  six  years  if  he  does  not  wish  to  serve  out 
his  life  term.  It  is  evident  that  the  Hamburg  Senate, 
while  in  many  respects  analogous  to  the  magistracy 
of  a  city  like  Berlin,  is  a  body  of  somewhat  different 
character  and  traditions.  It  is  less  technical  in  its 
quality  and  more  like  the  upper  house  of  a  general 
law-making  body.  It  is  not  a  group  of  highly  salaried 
civil  servants,  but  rather  a  board  selected  from  the 
most  competent  and  distinguished  of  the  classes  of 
citizens  who  give  Hamburg  its  character  as  a  great 
financial  and  mercantile  center.  In  many  matters  the 
Biirgerschaft  and  Senate  act  together.  The  Senate 
selects  from  its  own  membership,  for  two-year  terms, 
a  burgomaster  and  a  deputy  burgomaster,  one  of 
whom  presides  over  its  deliberations.  The  Senate 
usually  formulates  matters  of  legislation,  and  submits 
its  proposals  to  the  burgesses,  who  are  the  constitu- 

25 


CHAP.  VIL 

A  govern- 
ment domi- 
nated by 
merchants. 


The  Senate 
of  eighteen. 


Character  of 
the  body. 


The  burgo- 
master. 


386 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VII. 

Relations 

between 

Senate  and 

burgesses. 


The  working 
depart- 
ments. 


Health. 


Public 
works. 


Police 
authority. 


Education. 


tional  law-enacting  body.  The  Senate  has  a  revisory 
and  veto  power,  which,  however,  it  cannot  exercise  in 
matters  of  revenue  and  taxation.  Deadlocks  between 
the  two  bodies  are  determined  by  a  joint  arbitration 
board ;  or,  as  a  last  resort  when  constitutional  ques- 
tions are  involved,  an  appeal  may  be  taken  to  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  German  Empire,  which  sits  at 
Leipsic.  The  burgesses  maintain  a  standing  commit- 
tee of  twenty  members  whose  duty  it  is  to  observe  the 
whole  course  of  administration  and  report  to  the  full 
house. 

The  several  bureaus  of  administration  are  organized 
and  carried  on  under  the  Senate's  direction,  with  a 
senator  as  the  presiding  head  of  each  bureau.  The 
Biirgerschaft  and  Senate  cooperate  in  the  appointment 
of  citizen  members  of  each  administrative  board.  For 
example,  the  sanitary  administration  is  under  the  di- 
rection of  a  board  of  health  known  as  the  Medicinal- 
Collegium,  over  which  Senator  Dr.  Hachmaun  presides. 
Under  control  of  this  Collegium  are  the  salaried  di- 
rectors of  the  various  branches  of  the  health  work. 
Another  senator  presides  over  the  ^Ban-Deputation 
(Board  of  Construction  or  Public  Works),  which  has 
under  its  care  the  whole  oversight  of  building  opera- 
tions, whether  above  ground  or  below,  and  which 
employs  chief  engineers,  architects,  chief  inspectors, 
etc.  The  Polizei-Behorde  (Police  Authority)  forms  an- 
other bureau  of  administration,  with  a  wide  range  of 
duties  and  with  control  of  the  active  police  force. 
Then  one  finds  an  educational  administration,  pre- 
sided over  by  a  senator  and  securing  the  cooperation 
of  competent  citizen  members  of  elementary-  and 
high-school  boards.  There  is  an  Armen-Deputation 
(Charity  Board)  similarly  organized,  through  which  re- 
lief work,  such  as  I  have  described  as  pertaining  to  the 
Berlin  municipality,  is  carried  on.  A  Gefcingniss-De- 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITAEY  REFORMS 


387 


putation  (Prison  Board)  has  charge  of  penal  adminis- 
tration, a  Quai-Venvaltung  and  a  Hafen-Verwaltung 
(Quay  and  Harbor  Administrations)  have  control  of 
various  matters  pertaining  to  the  docks,  harbor,  and 
quays,  a  Friedkofs-Deputation  (Cemetery  Board)  man- 
ages the  municipal  burying-grounds,  and  various  other 
administrative  boards,  organized  and  working  under 
the  Senate's  auspices  and  with  a  senator  at  their  head, 
have  charge  of  other  governmental  undertakings. 
Most  important  of  all,  perhaps,  is  the  Finanz-Deputa- 
tion,  which  administers  the  finances  of  the  city-state. 

Here,  then,  one  finds  municipal  home-rule  in  the 
fullest  sense  of  the  term,  with  no  limitations  whatever. 
Though  attached  by  federal  bonds  to  a  monarchical 
empire,  the  chief  members  of  which  are  four  king- 
doms, Hamburg  is  as  unqualifiedly  republican  in  its 
government  as  any  Swiss  canton  or  American  State. 
It  may  change  its  constitution  whenever  it  likes  (a 
thorough  revision  was  made  in  1860,  important 
changes  were  again  accomplished  in  1879,  and  minor 
ones  were  brought  about  in  1894)  without  consulting 
any  external  or  superior  authority.  Such  complete 
independence,  of  course,  grows  out  of  the  fact  that 
Hamburg  is  a  state  as  well  as  a  city ;  and  however 
desirable  a  large  measure  of  municipal  autonomy 
might  be  for  every  other  urban  community,  it  is  man- 
ifest that  the  state  must  preserve  its  sovereignty. 
It  would  be  fortunate  for  a  few  cities,  however,  and 
particularly  for  the  city  of  New  York,  if  they  could 
be  erected  into  separate  states,  with  a  general  law- 
making  body  of  their  own  which  would  also  perform 
the  functions  of  a  city  council.  The  Hamburg  consti- 
tution, with  certain  changes  to  suit  the  different  cir- 
cumstances, could  be  applied  to  the  Greater  New  York 
with  immense  benefit  to  all  the  city's  interests. 

It  should  be  remarked  that  Hamburg's  position  as 


CHAP.  VII. 


Various 
other  de- 
partments. 


Hamburg's 
republican 
home-rule. 


A  position 

that  New 

York  might 

envy. 


388 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VII. 

Two  other 
"free  cities" 
in  Germany. 


Bremen  and 
its  govern- 
ment. 


The  Free 
City  of 
Lubeck. 


a  city-state  and  a  sovereign  republic  is  not  unique  in 
Germany,  but  remains  the  fortunate  heritage  of  two 
other  cities,  viz.,  Bremen  and  Lubeck.  Frankfort-on- 
the-Main  was  also  a  free  city  until  1866,  when  it  was 
annexed  to  Prussia.  The  free  city  of  Bremen  possesses 
a  domain  of  99  square  miles,  although  the  town  itself 
comprises  only  10  square  miles ;  and  of  a  total  pop- 
ulation approaching  200,000,  nearly  three  fourths 
are  found  living  inside  the  small  city  district.  But, 
as  in  the  case  of  Hamburg,  the  one  central  gov- 
ernment suffices  for  city  and  state.  Bremen's  Biir- 
gerschaft  is  a  body  of  150  members,  of  whom  14 
are  chosen  by  the  class  of  citizens  who  have  had  a 
university  education, —  that  is  to  say,  by  the  mem- 
bers of  the  learned  professions, —  42  are  chosen  by  the 
enrolled  merchants,  22  are  chosen  by  the  mechanics 
and  manufacturing  employees,  and  the  remaining 
72  by  all  the  other  taxpayers  of  Bremen,  most  of 
whom  are  unskilled  workmen.  The  Senate,  which 
as  in  Hamburg's  case  is  the  body  controlling  execu- 
tive affairs,  has  16  members,  of  whom  10  must  be 
lawyers.  The  principal  tasks  of  administration  are 
assigned  to  12  so-called  ministries,  over  each  of  which 
a  senator  presides,  and  these  are  organized  much 
after  the  fashion  of  the  departments  or  executive 
boards  of  Hamburg.  The  "Free  and  Hansa  City  of 
Lubeck"  is  the  third  of  these  German  city-states,  and 
its  organization  is  very  similar  to  Hamburg's,  al- 
though simpler  in  the  fact  that  the  House  of  Bur- 
gesses (120  members)  is  elected  wholly  by  the  equal 
votes  of  all  the  citizens,  with  no  class  preferences  of 
any  kind.  The  14  senators  are  chosen  for  life,  and 
their  body  must  contain  at  least  6  lawyers  and  5 
merchants.  Administrative  organization  is  similar  to 
that  of  Hamburg.  Liibeck's  whole  domain  includes 
115  square  miles,  the  town  comprising  about  12 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFOBMS 


389 


square  miles,  with  seven  eighths  of  the  total  popula- 
tion. The  town  itself  at  the  beginning  of  1895  had 
nearly  70,000  people,  the  number  having  doubled 
since  1870;  and  the  rural  districts  contained  a  sta- 
tionary population  of  10,000  or  12,000. 

These  three  German  free  cities  enjoy  the  advan- 
tages of  a  superb  management  of  their  financial  in- 
terests by  their  ablest  citizens.  The  debt  of  Bremen 
is  nearly  100,000,000  marks  —  a  large  sum  for  such 
a  city;  but  it  represents  investment  in  the  magnifi- 
cent harbor  improvements  and  railway  terminal  fa- 
cilities, and  in  the  other  advantageous  public  works, 
to  which  Bremen  owes  its  general  prosperity  as  the 
second  German  seaport,  and  as  a  great  focus  of  inter- 
national trade.  The  Hamburg  debt  in  1894  somewhat 
exceeded  327,000,000  marks.  The  recent  harbor  im- 
provements account  for  a  considerable  proportion  of 
the  amount,  while  other  needful  and  advantageous 
public  works  readily  explain  and  fully  justify  all  the 
rest  of  it. 

Hamburg's  very  life  has  been  the  great  river  Elbe. 
But  the  Elbe,  which  has  been  its  commercial  main- 
stay, has  brought  death  as  well  as  life.  The  river 
has  always  supplied  the  city  with  water  for  drinking 
and  domestic  uses,  and  its  unwholesomeness  had  long 
been  fully  confessed.  But  many  things  prevented, 
until  recently,  the  firm  attempt  to  solve  the  para- 
mount sanitary  problem  of  the  city's  drinking-water. 
Early  in  the  seventies  an  elaborate  investigation  re- 
sulted in  a  report  advising  the  filtration  of  the  entire 
Elbe  supply.  But  opposition  arose,  the  discussion 
was  protracted,  and  nothing  was  done.  The  inclusion 
of  Hamburg  in  the  new  German  Empire,  and  its  ac- 
cession at  last  to  the  German  customs-union,  led  to 
the  concentration  of  the  municipal  energy  upon  the 
development  of  the  port  facilities.  The  abandonment 

25* 


CHAP.  VII. 


Finances  of 
Bremen  and 
Hamburg. 


The  Elbe 
and  the 
Hamburg 
water-sup- 
ply. 


Develop- 
ment of  the 
port. 


390 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


tration  sys- 
tem. 


CHAP.  vii.  of  Hamburg's  status  as  an  independent  port,  and  its 
inclusion  in  the  tariff  system  of  Germany,  took  prac- 
tical effect  in  1888,  and  the  influence  upon  the  city's 
traffic  and  growth  was  both  immediate  and  very  im- 
portant. Meanwhile,  the  scientific  consideration  of 
the  water-supply  had  not  been  altogether  suspended, 
and  the  city's  enhanced  importance  furnished  a  new 
reason  for  action. 

In  1890  it  was  actually  determined  to  proceed  at 
once  with  the  construction  of  an  extensive  plant  for 
the  filtration  of  a  supply  of  Elbe  water  equal  to  the 

The  newfli-  entire  demand  upon  the  water  system  for  all  purposes. 
Expert  investigations,  with  reinvestigations  and  all 
sorts  of  cross-examinations,  had  resulted  in  a  plan 
that  was  adopted  with  confidence.  It  was  pronounced 
feasible  by  the  municipal  engineers  to  have  the  filtra- 
tion plant  ready  for  use  in  1894.  The  cholera  emer- 
gency led  to  prodigious  efforts,  and  the  new  system 
was  put  into  operation  in  May,  1893,  nearly  a  year 
ahead  of  time. 

The  last  seventy-five  miles  of  the  Elbe  form  an  estu- 
ary of  the  North  Sea,  and  the  tidal  movement  up  as  far 
as  Hamburg  is  considerable,  amounting  to  several  feet 
on  the  seaward  side  of  the  city.  The  Elbe  flows  north- 
ward; and  the  old  waterworks  were  situated  on  the 
southern  edge  of  the  city,  the  intention  being  that  the 
water  should  be  pumped  from  a  point  in  the  stream 
that  lay  above  the  brackish  and  polluting  influences 
of  the  flood  tide.  The  intake  was  in  the  middle  of  the 
river,  just  opposite  the  large  pumping-station,  high 
water-tower,  and  adjoining  reservoirs  which  consti- 
tuted the  old  waterworks  that  served  the  whole  city. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  intake  was  not  far  enough 
up-stream  to  escape  serious  contamination  from  the 
recession,  at  flood  tide,  of  the  polluted  water  of  the 
harbor  and  lower  stream. 


The  old  sup- 
ply of  Elbe 
water. 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  EEFORMS  391 

One  must  remember  that  the  Elbe  carries  off  the    CHAP.  vn. 
entire  sewage  of  Hamburg;  and  that  the  stupendous 
aggregation  of  ships,  of  wharves  and  warehouses,  and 
of  manufacturing  establishments  makes  the  water  of 
the  port  about  as  filthy  as  possible.    The  sewer  system    -n^  sewers 
of  Hamburg  is  by  no  means  a  bad  one.     The  houses  °fHamburg- 
are  all  connected  with  well-built  street-mains,  which 
empty  into  several  large  collecteurs,  or  sewage-canals. 
These  principal  conduits  in  turn  converge  and  join  in 
one  huge  discharging  sewer-tunnel,  which  is  carried 
well  out  into  the  channel  of  the  river,  and  empties 
at  the  lower   edge   of  the   city.    The  discharge  is 
dammed  in  and  held  back  during  the  hours  of  inflow- 
ing tide,  so  that  the  main  harbor,  and  the  numerous 
branching  navigable  fleete  or  canals,  that  make  Ham- 
burg something  like  Venice,  may  not  be  fouled  and 
gradually  filled  up  by  subsidence  from  the  immense 
volume  of  liquid  filth.     The  sewer-gates  are  opened    sewage  dis- 
only  when  the  ebbing  of  the  tide  joins  with  the  ordi-    ebb  ouide. 
nary  flow  of  the  river  to  give  a  sweeping  current  out 
to  sea.     This,  at  least,  is  a  far  better  arrangement  for 
sewage  disposal  than  certain  American  cities  lying  on 
tidal  water  possess,  which  dispense  with  collecteurs 
entirely,  and   discharge  their  sewage  at  numerous 
points  all  along  the  river  frontage. 

But  it  is  far  from  being  a  perfect  system.  For  al- 
though the  Elbe  estuary  is  a  broad  stream,  the  cities 
of  Hamburg  and  Altona  have  become  so  great  that 
the  combined  volume  of  their  refuse  material  is  enor-  contamina- 
mous ;  and  the  plan  of  discharging  at  ebb  tide  alone  "in*, 
cannot  wholly  prevent  the  subsequent  backflow  of 
pollution  from  the  sewers.  Quite  apart  from  any  and 
all  local  sources  of  contamination  at  Hamburg,  the 
Elbe  water  is  by  no  means  pure,  for  the  river  drains 
a  populous  valley,  and  has  many  large  towns  and 
villages  on  its  banks.  Hamburg  ought  long  ago  to 


392 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 


The  new 
intake. 


CHAP.  vii.  have  extended  its  intake  far  enough  upstream  to 
make  perfectly  sure  that  its  citizens  would  not  re- 
ceive again  through  their  water-pipes  the  fouled  ef- 
fluent of  their  drains.  But  at  the  time  of  the  cholera 
visitation  of  1892  the  old  intake  was  still  in  use,  and 
was  undoubtedly  within  the  sphere,  at  flood  tide,  of 
harbor  refuse  and  city  sewage.  An  essential  feature 
of  the  new  water  system,  therefore,  has  been  the  ex- 
tension of  the  receiving-tunnel  up  the  river  to  a  point 
some  miles  above  the  now  abandoned  intake.  This 
work  involved  very  large  expenditure,  since  the  new 
tunnel  had  to  be  constructed  under  the  bottom  of  the 
river. 

The  nitration  system,  however,  is  the  interesting 
feature  of  the  new  Hamburg  water-supply.  It  is  by 
far  the  largest  and  most  successful  "plant"  for  the 
removal  of  impurities  from  drinking-water  that  any 
city  has  yet  instituted.  It  happens  that  Hamburg  is 
so  situated  that  it  is  practically  compelled  to  draw  its 
water-supply  from  the  river.  There  are  no  mountain 
sources  accessible.  Naples,  like  Vienna  and  Munich 
and  Glasgow,  has  been  able  to  secure  abundant  water 
from  high  and  uncontaminated  mountain  regions. 
But  Hamburg  lies  in  the  lowlands,  at  the  mouth  of 
a  broad  valley.  We  have  a  number  of  cities  in  the 
United  States  that  seem  to  be  under  the  necessity 
for  all  time  of  drawing  their  water-supplies  from  the 
much-polluted  rivers  on  the  banks  of  which  they  are 
situated.  For  these  cities  the  question  of  an  effec- 
tive method  of  filtration  has  the  very  highest  conse- 
quence. From  Minneapolis  to  New  Orleans  the  cities 
of  the  Mississippi  Valley  are  concerned.  If  the  Elbe 
and  the  Rhine  can  be  completely  filtered,  there  need 
be  little  question  about  American  rivers. 

A  general  description  of  the  Hamburg  system  can 
easily  be  given.  The  city  was  fortunate  in  owning 


Treatment 
of  river 
water. 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS  393 

two  large  islands  in  the  Elbe,  which  have  been  con-  CHAP.  vn. 
nected  by  a  narrow  embankment,  and  which  extend 
from  a  point  near  the  old  waterworks  up-stream  for  Theftitra- 
a  distance  of  about  two  miles.  The  uppermost  of  ^^nbedT 
these  islands,  the  Bill  warder  Insel,  is  the  larger  of  the 
two.  Somewhat  further  up  the  river  is  the  new  intake, 
with  its  well  screened  and  guarded  opening.  The  re- 
ceiving-tunnel is  perhaps  ten  feet  in  diameter.  On 
this  upper  island  have  been  constructed  four  large 
reservoirs,  or  sedimentary  basins,  as  it  might  be  bet- 
ter to  call  them,  each  of  which  has  a  capacity  approxi- 
mately equal  to  the  supply  of  the  city  for  one  day. 
A  new  pumping-plant  on  the  island  lifts  the  water 
into  these  basins.  The  four  are  used  in  rotation.  It  ment  basins. 
has  been  found  by  experiment  that  the  best  results 
are  attained  by  allowing  the  water  to  stand  undis- 
turbed for  about  twenty-one  hours.  Sluices  and 
valves  enable  the  basins  to  be  used  separately  and 
successively.  Thus,  while  Basin  I.  is  engaged  in  feed- 
ing the  filters  that  supply  the  city,  Basin  II.  is  full 
and  closed  for  a  day's  deposit  of  sediment,  Basin  III. 
is  being  pumped  full  from  the  intake,  and  Basin  IV., 
which  is  quite  empty,  is  in  process  of  being  scraped 
and  cleansed.  When  Basin  I.'s  supply  has  been  drawn 
off,  it  in  turn  is  closed  for  removal  of  sediment,  Basin 
II.  is  put  into  connection  with  the  filters,  Basin  III.  is 
full  and  closed,  and  Basin  IV.,  having  been  cleaned 
out,  is  again  receiving  a  supply  from  the  river.  And 
so  the  rotation  is  complete.  Each  of  these  sedimen- 
tary basins  has  a  superficial  area  of  perhaps  25  acres. 
The  screens  at  the  intake  mouth  of  course  keep  out 
all  large  extraneous  objects.  The  settling  process  in 
the  great  basins  further  disposes  of  fine  sand,  and  of 
very  much  of  the  mud  and  silt  that  discolor  the  water 
as  originally  received.  But  from  the  hygienic  point 
of  view,  it  is  obvious  that  nothing  of  very  radical  im- 


394 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


The  fllter- 
basins. 


Filtration 
elsewhere. 


portance  has  been  gained  by  the  mere  fact  of  a  day's 
rest  in  a  settling-basin.  It  is  in  the  filtering-basins 
that  the  revolutionizing  results  are  attained. 

The  lower  island,  the  Kalte  Hofe,  lying  just  above 
the  old  waterworks  on  the  east  bank  of  the  Elbe,  at 
the  Rothenburg  suburb,  presents  a  sight  best  seen 
from  the  top  of  the  waterworks  tower,  and  one  quite 
worth  the  climb  of  365  steps.  One  looks  down  upon 
an  island  perhaps  three  fourths  of  a  mile  long  and 
one  fourth  of  a  mile  wide,  the  greater  part  of  which 
is  covered  with  even  rows  of  rectangular  basins,  each 
of  which  has  a  surface  of  7500  square  meters,  or 
about  two  acres.  There  are  22  of  these  open  filter- 
basins.  To  describe  their  mechanism  in  detail  would 
involve  engineering  technicalities.  It  will  be  enough 
to  tell  in  a  general  way  how  they  are  made  and  how 
they  work.  In  principle  they  are  not  original.  Sand 
filtration  has  been  in  use  to  some  extent  for  many 
years.  Altona,  the  flourishing  manufacturing  city  of 
150,000  inhabitants  that  lies  solidly  against  Hamburg 
on  the  side  toward  the  sea  and  is  virtually  part  and 
parcel  of  the  larger  cit}T,  had  for  30  years  used  sand 
filtration  to  make  Elbe  water  potable.  Berlin  also 
filters  through  sand-lined  basins  a  considerable  part 
of  its  drinking-water.  The  London  water  companies 
have  made  successful  use  of  the  same  system,  and 
other  cities  have  had  some  experience  of  this  mode 
of  water  purification.  The  Hamburg  plant  on  the 
Kalte  Hofe  is  notable,  therefore,  not  for  the  intro- 
duction of  a  new  principle,  but  rather  for  the  utili- 
zation of  an  old  principle  in  a  far  more  complete  and 
successful  working-plant  than  any  other  city  has  yet 
established,  and  for  exact  and  novel  demonstrations 
concerning  the  action  of  the  filters  upon  disease 
germs  such  as  were  wholly  unprecedented  and  are  of 
inestimable  value. 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS 


395 


Construc- 
tion of 
filters. 


The  filter-basins  on  the  Kalte  Hofe,  like  the  large  CHAP.  vn. 
sedimentary  basins  on  the  Billwarder  Insel,  are  con- 
structed with  the  utmost  care,  being  lined  very  solidly 
with  clay,  concrete,  hard  brick  masonry,  and  cement 
plaster.  Across  the  floor  of  each  filter-basin  are 
many  large  pipes  perforated  with  countless  holes. 
The  basin  itself  being  ready,  and  the  punctured  pipes 
being  in  place,  the  process  of  filling  begins.  First 
comes  a  layer  of  small,  well-selected  stones,  covering 
the  floor  to  a  depth  of  about  eight  inches.  Then  is 
spread,  to  a  like  depth,  a  layer  of  gravel  —  that  is,  of 
stones  smaller  than  those  forming  the  bottom  stratum, 
but  much  coarser  than  the  layer  of  coarse  sand,  also 
eight  inches  deep,  that  is  next  placed  above  it.  Upon 
these  three  foundation  layers  is  deposited  the  princi- 
pal material  of  the  filter,  namely,  a  layer  of  fine  sand, 
one  meter  (nearly  forty  inches)  deep.  When  the  filter 
is  in  use,  the  water  stands  exactly  one  meter  deep  on 
the  meter  of  fine  sand.  Ingenious  automatic  regula- 
tors so  control  the  inflow  and  outflow  as  to  keep  the 
water  at  an  unvarying  depth  of  one  meter.  It  would 
be  superfluous  to  attempt  a  detailed  explanation  of  Adjustment 
the  admirable  adjustment  of  all  the  parts  of  the  wa- 
ter system  to  one  another.  It  is  enough  to  say  that 
the  pumping  facilities  are  well  adapted  to  the  re- 
quirements of  the  sedimentary  basins,  that  the  filter- 
basins  are  nicely  adjusted  to  receive  and  dispose  of 
the  quantity  discharged  from  the  Billwarder  Insel, 
and  that  the  arrangements  of  the  old  water-station 
on  the  mainland  at  the  Rothenburgs-ort  are  fully 
equal  to  the  reception  of  the  purified  effluent  of  the 
filters,  and  its  distribution  throughout  the  entire  city. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  this  system,  when  once 
established,  needs  no  further  care  or  attention.  The 
filters  are  all  under  constant  inspection,  and  one  by 
one  they  are  cut  off  temporarily  from  active  service 


of  the  va- 
rious parts. 


396 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Cleansing 
the  filters. 


Sifting  out 
microbes. 


CHAP.  vii.  in  order  to  be  emptied  into  the  river  and  cleansed. 
Adjacent  to  the  group  of  filter-basins  is  an  establish- 
ment fitted  up  with  facilities  for  cleansing  the  sand 
and  small  stones.  Ordinarily,  it  is  found  quite  suffi- 
cient to  remove  a  few  inches  of  the  fine  sand  for  pu- 
rification, leaving  the  rest  of  the  filter  undisturbed.  It 
is  not,  indeed,  desirable  to  take  away  all  the  deposits 
that  the  sand  retains  from  the  water  as  it  trickles 
through.  A  certain  amount  of  "  scum  n  must  be  col- 
lected before  the  filter  is  at  its  best.  It  must  be  re- 
membered that  the  chief  purpose  of  the  filter  is  the  re- 
moval of  microbes,  whose  existence  can  be  ascertained 
only  by  bacteriological  tests.  These  bacilli  are  so 
minute  —  as  we  laymen  are  assured  by  the  learned 
scientists  —  that  myriads  of  them  would  not  feel 
themselves  crowded  on  the  point  of  the  finest  needle. 
A  bed  of  ordinary  sand  and  gravel  could  therefore 
hardly  be  expected  to  filter  out  the  microbes  as  if  they 
were  so  many  crawfishes.  The  bacteriologists  tell  us 
that  it  is  the  scum,  collecting  on  the  sand  and  filling 
the  interstices  between  the  stony  particles,  that  some- 
how manages  to  detain  the  microbes  while  the  water 
passes  on  purified  and  wholesome. 

Let  no  one  suppose  that  this  is  a  mere  matter  of 
conjecture,  or  of  an  occasional  test  with  dubious  re- 
sults. The  effect  of  the  Hamburg  filtration  upon  the 
bacteriological  condition  of  the  Elbe  water  is  a  subject 
of  constant  examination  and  precise  knowledge.  The 
whole  system,  during  and  after  the  summer  of  1893, 
was  operated  with  reference  to  the  fact  that  the  Elbe 
had  been  discovered  to  contain  cholera  germs,  and  that 
Hamburg  proposed  to  give  its  people  a  water  free 
from  those  germs.  To  this  end,  a  municipal  bacteri- 
ological laboratory  was  established,  and  to  its  director 
was  accorded  an  almost  dictatorial  authority.  At  th,e 
time  of  the  epidemic  in  1892,  the  distinguished  author- 


A  matter 
of  precise 
knowledge. 


HAMBUEG  AND  ITS   SANITAEY  EEFOKMS 


397 


ity  Professor  Gaffky,  of  the  University  of  Giessen,  CHAP.  vn. 
came  to  Hamburg  to  assume  temporary  charge  of  san- 
itary arrangements.  He  brought  with  him  from  Gies- 
sen, as  his  assistant,  and  left  behind  him  in  control  of 
the  new  Hygienic  Institute,  a  young  American  bacte- 
riologist, Professor  Dunbar.  Dr.  Dunbar  very  rapidly  a^f  STn1/ 
and  effectively  developed  the  Hamburg  municipal  gientutensti' 
laboratory  into  one  of  the  most  important  in  the 
world,  and  gave  it  a  practical  relationship  to  health 
conditions  that  the  authorities  of  Hamburg  could  not 
fail  to  recognize.  Dr.  Koch  came  later  from  Berlin,  on 
behalf  of  the  imperial  government,  to  aid  and  advise 
in  the  struggle  to  subdue  the  epidemic,  and  he  was 
surprised  and  delighted  to  discover  the  rare  scientific 
quality  and  the  comprehensive  scope  of  the  work  Dr. 
Dunbar  had  already  accomplished.  Dr.  Koch  there- 
upon acquiesced  very  heartily  in  the  proposal  that  Dr. 
Dunbar  should  be  given  the  permanent  post  of  direc- 
tor of  the  Hamburg  Institute,  and  thus  made  the 
authoritative  expert  in  control  of  the  health  condi- 
tions of  the  principal  German  port  and  the  first  com- 
mercial city  of  the  Continent.  Dr.  Duubar  is  a  native 
of  St.  Paul,  Minn.  ;  and  when  he  went  to  Germany, 
some  years  ago,  at  the  age  of  twenty-one,  he  could 
speak  English  only.  In  order  to  accept  the  official 
post  he  now  holds,  he  was  obliged  to  become  natural- 
ized as  a  German  citizen. 

Dr.  Dunbar  commands  the  services  of  a  staff  of  ex- 
pert assistants,  and  his  Institute  conducts  many  exper- 
iments of  extraordinary  interest.  A  new  method  for 
the  discovery  of  cholera  germs  in  water  was  devised 
by  him  and  accepted  by  Dr.  Koch  and  the  other  bac- 

.  . 

teriologists  as  a  great  improvement.  During  the  sum- 
mer  and  autumn  of  1893,  the  Hamburg  Institute  tested 
the  Elbe  water  from  day  to  day,  —  the  specimens  being 
taken  from  widely  separated  points,  —  and  found  chol- 


cholera 

germs  in 

the  Elbe. 


398  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vii.  era  germs  all  the  way  from  the  mouth  to  places  far  in 
the  interior  of  Germany.  Dr.  Dunbar  seems  to  have 
succeeded  in  proving  effectually  —  what  has  hitherto 
been  much  doubted  and  denied  —  that  cholera  is  prop- 
agated by  means  of  water  rather  than  air. 

In  the  filthy  water  brought  up  to  Hamburg  by  the 
flood  tide  Dr.  Dunbar  and  his  group  of  experts  were 
Remarkable  quite  regularly  finding  from  30,000  to  100,000  cholera 
Oration?1"  germs  to  each  cubic  centimeter  (about  one  sixteenth  of 
a  cubic  inch)  of  water.  As  many  germs  were  found 
in  the  season  of  1893  as  in  the  previous  year,  although 
Hamburg  was  kept  almost  free  from  fresh  outbreaks 
of  cholera.  The  water  of  the  river  above  the  influence 
of  flood  tide  was  found  to  contain  from  400  to  1200 
germs.  In  July,  1893,  the  imperial  health  authorities 
at  Berlin  issued  a  warning  to  the  municipal  govern- 
ments of  the  country  not  to  supply  their  citizens  with 
a  drinking-water  containing  more  than  100  cholera 
germs  to  the  cubic  centimeter.  It  was  considered  that 
water  infected  to  no  greater  extent  could  be  used  with- 
out serious  danger.  It  is  highly  instructive,  therefore, 
to  note  the  fact  that  the  purified  water  of  the  new 
Hamburg  filtration-works,  as  examined  from  filter  to 
filter  and  from  day  to  day,  was  found  sometimes  to 
contain  no  germs  at  all,  and  more  commonly  to  con- 
tain from  four  to  ten  germs  per  cubic  centimeter. 
Only  by  the  most  refined  methods,  never  employed 
until  the  summer  of  1893,  could  these  few  scattered 
germs  be  discovered,  isolated,  and  accurately  counted. 
Here,  then,  is  the  great  triumph  of  the  Hamburg 
filtration-works.  The  citizens  know  absolutely  that 
the  new  system  has  given  them  a  safe  supply,  and  feel 
that  science  is  now  equal  to  any  emergency  that  may 
arise.  The  purified  Elbe  water  is  used  for  all  city 
purposes,  including  street- washing,  lawn-  and  garden- 
sprinkling,  and  sewer-flushing.  It  is  of  excellent 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS  399 

quality  for  all  industrial  purposes,  and  as  a  drinking-    CHAP.  vn. 
water  it  is  agreeable  as  well  as  safe. 

An  indirect  evidence  that  the  cholera  epidemic  was 
induced  through  the  use  of  Elbe  water  was  furnished  Use  of  wells 
by  the  fact  that  the  parts  of  Hamburg  which  use  wells  inHamburg- 
instead  of  the  river-supply  were  almost  or  quite  ex- 
empt from  the  disease.  There  are  perhaps  800  or 
1000  wells  in  use  within  the  city  limits.  On  general 
health  principles  wells  are  to  be  condemned,  and  their 
extermination  by  most  city  governments  has  been  fully 
justified;  but,  as  a  choice  of  evils,  the  Hamburg  wells 
were  better  than  the  unfiltered  river-water,  and  so 
they  were  tolerated.  Some  of  the  large  breweries 
have  very  productive  artesian  wells.  At  the  time  of 
the  epidemic  their  water  was  piped  to  many  neighbor- 
ing houses,  and  the  service  was  afterward  continued. 
At  that  time  also,  in  the  fall  of  1892,  more  than  a  hun- 
dred new  "  driven "  wells  were  made ;  but  many  of 
them  could  not  be  used,  on  account  of  the  mineral 
constituents  of  the  water.  A  part  of  the  work  of  Dr. 
Dunbar's  Hygienic  Institute,  in  the  fall  of  1893,  was 
the  thorough  examination  and  testing  of  all  the  wells 
of  the  city.  The  health  authorities  were,  of  course, 
empowered  to  close  all  wells  found  to  be  yielding  un- 
wholesome water. 

The  Hygienic  Institute  has  a  branch  laboratory, 
with  every  needed  convenience,  immediately  adjacent 
to  the  filtration-works ;  and  one  of  the  large  filters  is 
used  exclusively  for  the  Institute's  tests  and  experi- 
ments. One  of  Dr.  Dunbar's  chief  assistantsis  stationed 
constantly  at  the  waterworks.  There  has  been  con- 
structed for  Dr.  Dunbar's  use,  upon  plans  of  his  own, 
a  novel  steam  craft,  to  ply  on  the  Elbe  as  a  floating  laboratory. 
bacteriological  laboratory.  The  boat  is  about  forty 
feet  in  length,  and  its  remarkable  equipment  will 
make  it  possible  to  study  far  more  fully  than  has  yet 


400  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vii.  been  done  the  actual  extent  and  nature  of  the  influence 
of  flood  tide  in  the  Elbe,  and  also  to  give  frequent  at- 
tention to  the  health  conditions  of  the  great  stream  in 
its  upper  courses.  All  these  new  projects  and  devices 
will  have  cost  a  good  deal  of  money;  but  shrewd, 
commercial  Hamburg  has  come  to  the  conclusion  that 

Expert  sani-  3 

taryknow-    improved  sanitary  services  are  a  highly  profitable  m- 

ledge  as  a  *        .  . 

good  invest-  vestment,  and  that  it  would  be  as  unwise  to  spend 
large  sums  upon  such  services  without  expert  scientific 
direction  and  experimentation  as  to  erect  public  build- 
ings without  good  architects,  or  invest  heavily  in  docks 
and  harbor  facilities  without  the  aid  of  civil  engineers. 
Dr.  Dunbar  is  evidently  determined  to  make  the  largest 
possible  use  of  the  city  government's  new  impulses  to- 
ward the  generous  support  of  hygienic  inquiry  and 
reform. 

The  circumstances  under  which  cholera  again  ap- 
peared in  Hamburg  about  the  middle  of  September, 

A  demon-    1893,  only  serve  to  illustrate  the  value  both  of  the  fil- 

stration  in  '  * 

1893.  tration-works  and  of  the  Hygienic  Institute.  Tests 
made  at  that  time  showed  the  alarming  increase  of 
germs  in  the  filtered  water  as  conveyed  for  consump- 
tion. It  was  further  discovered  that  the  water  was 
pure  as  it  left  the  filters,  and  that  the  contamination 
was  the  result  of  a  bad  leakage  from  the  Elbe  into  the 
tunnel  which  conveys  the  supply  from  the  Kalte  Hofe 
to  the  pumping- works  on  the  mainland.  The  leak  was 
at  last  suppressed,  but,  unfortunately,  a  number  of 
cases  of  illness  and  death  occurred,  clearly  traceable 
in  origin  to  this  infusion  of  unfiltered  water  into  the 
purified  supply.  The  fact  that  Hamburg  had  been 
exempt  from  cholera  all  summer,  while  the  river  was 
laden  with  such  deadly  infection,  speaks  volumes  for 
the  filtered  water  which  had  been  in  use  since  May; 
and  the  prompt  discovery  of  the  leakage  was  a  new 
demonstration  of  the  practical  usefulness  of  an  efficient 


HAMBUEG  AND  ITS  SANITAEY  EEFOKMS 


401 


bacteriological  laboratory.  The  Hygienic  Institute, 
meanwhile,  does  not  exist  solely  to  fight  cholera  epi- 
demies.  Bacteriology  has  various  services  to  perform 
constantly  in  the  aid  of  the  health  authorities  of  cities. 
It  can  turn  its  attention  from  one  form  of  infectious 
disease  to  another,  and  can  help  in  many  ways  to 
promote  wholesome  conditions  in  general. 

I  have  already  commented  upon  Hamburg's  sewers 
and  its  disposal  of  sewage.  It  remains  to  speak 
somewhat  of  the  scavenging  and  cleansing  of  the 
city.  The  cholera  outbreak  seems  to  have  resulted 

,     .  ,.  -it.  j  £    it, 

iu  a  vast  increase  of  energy  in  the  conduct  of  the 
work.  Street-cleansing,  under  the  general  control  of 
the  police  authorities,  is  managed  upon  a  good  system 
with  admirable  effect.  No  American  city,  so  far  as  I 
am  aware,  can  compare  at  all  favorably  with  maligned 
Hamburg  in  the  matter  of  clean  streets.  Good  pav- 
ing is  the  rule,  and  this  of  course  facilitates  the  con- 
stant  washings  and  sweepings  to  which  the  streets  are 
subjected.  Asphalt  and  smoothly  laid  square  stone 
blocks  are  the  prevailing  material  of  the  street  sur- 
face. Besides  the  thorough  night  cleansings,  there  is 
a  day  force  of  sweepers  regularly  at  work  on  the  prin- 
cipal thoroughfares  to  remove  horse  manure,  etc.,  quite 
in  the  approved  manner  of  Paris  and  Berlin.  Every 
main  street  has  its  entire  and  radical  cleansing  as  often 
as  once  in  twenty-four  hours,  and  all  other  streets,  no 
matter  how  quiet  and  little  used,  are  carefully  swept 
and  cleansed  several  times  a  week.  The  sprinkling  in 
summer  is  no  less  thorough,  while  in  winter  the  re- 
moval of  snow  and  ice  is  so  efficient  and  prompt  as  to 
be  noteworthy.  In  all  details  the  public  cleansing  and 
street  maintenance  have  been  vastly  improved  since 
1892,  with  the  deliberate  sanitary  motive. 

The  city  also  laid  energetic  hands  upon  the  question 
of  the  disposal  of  domestic  refuse.  Garbage  had 

26 


CHAP.  vn. 

General  use- 
the  Hygienic 


cleansing 

andscaven- 

ging. 


Effective 
streetwork- 


402  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vii.  hitherto  been  carted  out  and  dumped  upon  land  in 
the  vicinity  of  the  city,  some  kinds  of  refuse,  however, 
being  carried  out  to  sea  in  barges.  Since  1893  the 
garbage  has  been  burned,  large  municipal  crematories 
having  been  constructed.  There  is  no  reason  why 

Disposal  of  Hamburg  should  not  establish  a  factory,  such  as  one 
refuse,  finds  in  various  European  cities,  for  the  preparation  of 
a  marketable  fertilizer  and  other  salable  commodities, 
from  the  collected  garbage,  street-sweepings,  ashes, 
and  waste  material  in  general  of  so  great  a  city.  This 
will  probably  be  done  in  the  early  future. 

The  fright  to  which  the  cholera  subjected  the  popu- 
lation has  been  of  inestimable  aid  to  the  sanitary  police 
in  their  efforts  to  compel  the  people  to  maintain  do- 
mestic cleanliness.     There  remain  in  Hamburg  many 
Housing     of  the  very  narrow,  badly  lighted  streets  of  the  middle 

conditions.  ages>  with  small-windowed  old  houses,  ill  arranged 
for  subdivision  into  tenement  apartments  and  for  the 
occupancy  of  numerous  families.  Obviously,  it  is  no 
easy  task  to  keep  these  streets  free  from  conditions 
favorable  to  the  spread  of  infection.  But  a  wonder- 
ful improvement  has  been  made,  under  rigidly  en- 
forced sanitary  regulations,  in  the  average  wholesome- 
ness  of  domestic  life  among  the  working-people.  The 
whole  code  of  regulations  concerning  the  building  and 
occupancy  of  houses  could  not  well  be  revised  in  a  day 
as  an  emergency  measure,  for  too  many  far-reaching 
considerations  were  involved.  The  Hamburg  building 
code  had  been  made  over  in  1882 ;  but  now  it  was  per- 
ceived that  its  thorough  remodeling  would  be  ne- 
cessary, with  a  view  to  many  sanitary  improvements. 

Reform  of    Some  ref  orms,  however,  could  not  be  delayed  ;  and  in 
e law's.'"8  April,  1893,  a  series  of  brief  amendments  to  the  build- 
ing code  of  1882  was  adopted,  to  remain   effective 
until  a  deliberate  treatment  of  the  entire  subject  could 
be  had.     The  size  and  form  of  interior  court  areas 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS  403 

were  prescribed,  with  stricter  insistence  than  before  CHAP.  vn. 
upon  opportunities  for  light  and  air.  Sanitary  plumb- 
ing arrangements  in  tenement-houses  were  explicitly 
required.  Most  important  of  all,  the  occupancy  of 
cellars  and  basements  for  residence  purposes  was 
made  subject  to  greatly  needed  regulations.  The 
census  of  1890  had  shown  that  36,542  people  in  Ham-  cellar  dweii- 

.  inSa  m 

burg  were  living  in  cellar  dwellings  —  6£  per  cent.  Hamburg, 
of  the  total  population.  In  1885  the  number  had 
been  31,381.  Special  attention  had  been  called  dur- 
ing the  cholera  season  to  the  extraordinarily  high 
rate  of  mortality  in  these  damp  subterranean  abodes. 
To  abolish  cellar  dwellings  peremptorily  and  immedi- 
ately in  a  city  like  Hamburg  is,  unfortunately,  a  prac- 
tical impossibility.  Even  in  Berlin,  with  its  enlightened 
sanitary  rules  and  methods,  there  were  117,702  cellar 
occupants  in  1890, —  7§  per  cent,  of  the  entire  mass  of  compared 
Berlin  ers  ;  and  Altona,  which  is  actually  a  contiguous  ami  Aitona! 
part  of  the  Hamburg  metropolis,  afforded  nothing 
better  than  cellar  homes  for  8.7  per  cent,  of  its  people. 
Of  cellar  residences  it  is  always  to  be  understood,  how- 
ever, that  some  are  much  worse  than  others.  It  is  the 
object  of  recent  sanitary  enactments  in  Europe  to  pro- 
hibit the  residential  use  of  the  worst  classes  of  cellars. 
Thus  the  new  Hamburg  rules  prohibit  the  occupancy  of  The  new 
cellars  under  houses  that  do  not  front  upon  the  street.  rules!18 
Cellars  in  the  low  parts  of  the  town  near  the  Elbe 
and  other  waterways  must  not  be  inhabited.  For- 
merly cellars  of  considerable  depth  and  very  badly 
lighted  were  to  some  extent  occupied  for  living  pur- 
poses. But  the  rule  of  April,  1893,  declares  that  the 
cellar  floor  must  not  be  more  than  one  meter  (about  3 
feet  and  4  inches)  below  the  level  of  the  surrounding 
ground,  while  special  provisions  are  also  made  for  the 
best  possible  admission  of  light  and  prevention  of 
damp  floors.  These  regulations  apply  to  cellars  and 


404 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


One-room 
dwellings. 


Hospitals 

for  isolating 

infection. 


Transport 
service. 


Disinfection 
stations. 


basements  that  are  used  for  workrooms  or  domestic 
kitchens,  as  well  as  to  those  that  are  occupied  as 
dwellings;  and  in  all  such  cases  there  must  be  a 
sewer  in  the  adjoining  street,  with  which  proper  con- 
nections have  been  made. 

Apart  from  the  cellar  residences,  the  overcrowding 
of  families  in  one-room  apartments  remains  a  serious 
evil  in  Hamburg,  and  one  that  will  call  for  future 
legislation.  But  the  average  housing  conditions  tend 
to  improve  very  visibly. 

The  epidemic  of  1892  found  Hamburg  ill  prepared 
with  facilities  for  the  isolation  of  cases,  and  for  the 
disinfection  of  contaminated  articles  and  houses.  Or- 
dinary hospitals  had  to  be  used  for  cholera  patients, 
and  extra  accommodations  had  to  be  provided  by 
means  of  hastily  erected  emergency  barracks  in  all 
parts  of  the  town.  Meanwhile,  a  vast  new  epidemic 
hospital  on  the  pavilion  plan  was  projected,  and  it  is 
now  completed  and  in  working  order.  It  is  one  of 
the  largest  and  best  appointed  hospitals  for  infectious 
diseases  to  be  found  anywhere;  and  it  will  play  an 
important  part  in  the  future  suppression,  at  the  very 
outset,  of  threatened  epidemics.  Urgent  necessity, 
moreover,  led  to  the  organization  of  an  excellent 
transport  service  for  the  removal  of  patients  from 
their  homes  to  the  hospitals;  and  this  has  been  put 
upon  a  permanent  basis  with  very  superior  appliances. 
It  will  be  found  as  useful  in  helping  to  check  the 
spread  of  other  maladies  as  in  times  of  cholera  out- 
break. 

The  disinfection  stations,  also,  are  a  new  feature 
of  Hamburg's  sanitary  administration,  and  they  are 
excellent  specimens  of  establishments  of  that  sort. 
Two  central  ones  were  fitted  up  in  existing  buildings 
adapted  for  the  purpose,  while  a  much  larger  and 
more  complete  one  has  since  been  made  ready  for 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITAKY  REFORMS  405 

use.  They  are  equipped  with  large  oveus  for  the  CHAP.  vn. 
disinfection  by  heat  of  bedding,  clothing,  draperies, 
carpets,  etc.,  and  have  facilities  for  the  detention  and 
personal  disinfection  and  cleansing  of  the  unattacked 
members  of  a  family  whose  house  is  undergoing  dis- 
infection after  the  stricken  members  have  been  re- 
moved to  hospital  or  to  cemetery.  The  disinfection 
station  is  headquarters  for  the  closed  vans  that  are  The  staff  of 
sent  to  remove  persons  and  infected  articles,  and  also  'officials.011 
for  the  disinfection  officials  whose  task  it  is  to  take 
charge  of  a  house  and  put  it  in  good  sanitary  con- 
dition. Each  one  of  these  officers  is  supplied  with  a 
compact,  portable  metallic  box,  in  which  there  is  a 
curiously  complete  collection  of  scrubbing-brushes, 
chemicals,  and  implements  and  devices  for  the  thor- 
ough cleansing  of  a  condemned  habitation. 

Food  examination  lies  within  the  scope  of  Dr.  Dun-  T 

Food  inspec- 

bar's  municipal  laboratory,  and  a  staff  of  assistants  is       tion- 
steadily  engaged  in  this  branch  of  the  work,  which 
has  taken  on  some  important  developments.     The 
milk-supply  of  Hamburg,  in  particular,  has  now  been 
brought  under  the  close  municipal  oversight  that  is 
so  desirable  in  all  large  towns,  a  very  elaborate,  law 
to  that  end  having  been  enacted  in  April,  1894,  after    overseeing 
more  than  a  year's  inquiry  and  deliberation.   Nothing      supply. 
could  better  illustrate  the  deliberate  and  permanent 
nature  of  the  new  sanitary  activity  of  the  Hamburg 
authorities  than  the  manner  in  which  they  have  dealt 
with  this  question  of  the  regulation  of  the  traffic  in 
milk.     Undoubtedly,   under  present  conditions,  the 
importance  to  a  city  population  of  a  pure  and  whole- 
some milk- supply  is  surpassed  only  by  the  importance 
of  a  pure  and  wholesome  water-supply.     The  new     ^^ein0f 
rules  begin  at  the  very  source  of  supply, — regulating    new  rules, 
the  care  of  cows  on  the  farms,  requiring  cleanliness 
in  the  stables,  ordaining  that  the  milker's  hands  must 

26* 


406 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


Cleanliness 
required  in 
beer-shops. 


A  new  use 
for  the  po- 
lice power. 


always  be  washed  as  well  as  the  cow's  udder,  and  in 
other  details  fixing  a  standard  none  too  fastidious 
yet  altogether  novel  to  the  average  dairyman.  The 
standards  for  specific  gravity  and  for  percentage  of 
cream  are  rigidly  fixed,  and  the  penalties  for  watering 
or  other  adulteration  are  severe  and  certain.  The 
cleanliness  of  the  milk-shops  and  utensils  of  distribu- 
tion in  the  city  are  as  carefully  prescribed  as  the  con- 
ditions on  the  dairy  farms.  The  general  result  can 
but  be  visible  in  the  improved  health  of  the  Hamburg 
children. 

A  more  novel  but — for  a  German  city — hardly  less 
desirable  sanitary  intervention  is  embodied  in  the 
rules  issued  by  the  police  authorities  of  Hamburg 
in  August,  1894,  regarding  the  sanitary  condition  of 
the  apparatus  used  in  public-houses  and  refreshment 
places  which  keep  beer  on  draught,  and  also  in  the 
minute  prescription  of  rules  for  the  cleansing  of  the 
vessels  from  which  the  guests  of  such  houses  drink 
their  beer  or  other  beverages.  The  German  bacteri- 
ologists had  discovered  a  real  source  of  danger  in  the 
transmission  of  disease  germs  by  means  of  imper- 
fectly washed  beer  glasses,  mugs,  and  pewters;  and 
Hamburg  now  prescribes  a  daily  scalding  and  scour- 
ing, besides  the  rinsing  with  pure  running  water  after 
each  emptying  of  the  vessel.  Do  these  seem  trivial 
matters,  beneath  the  dignity  of  the  public  authorities 
of  a  great  city?  The  wisest  men  think  otherwise. 
They  know  of  no  better  possible  use  to  make  of  the 
police  power  of  government  than  to  prevent  the 
transmission  of  deadly  disease  germs  in  places  of 
public  resort  through  culpable  negligence  of  enlight- 
ened health  rules.  It  is  quite  as  permissible  a  police 
function  to  see  that  beer- venders  keep  their  glasses 
clean  as  to  prevent  brawling  and  violence  in  the 
streets  —  and  in  practice  a  far  more  important  one  to 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITARY  REFORMS 


407 


the  social  well-being.  Of  course  I  use  the  term  po- 
lice  function  in  its  broad  sense.  Bacteriology  is  fast 
changing  the  practical  character  of  the  tasks  of  inter- 
vention  that  have  to  be  exercised  in  the  name  of  the 
police  authority  of  the  state,  as  it  supplies  us  with 
new  knowledge;  so  that  Hamburg  now  concerns 
itself  with  seeing  that  dairymen  wash  their  hands 
before  milking,  and  that  saloon-keepers  scour  their 
tankards,  while  the  sanitary  inspector  and  the  disin- 
fection officer  are  more  important  by  far  than  the 
night-watchman  or  the  ordinary  patrolman. 

There  had  been  a  chemical  laboratory  for  public 
purposes  under  the  police  authority  of  Hamburg  for  a 
long  time;  but  this  was  metamorphosed  into  the  Hy- 
gienic Institute  in  1892.  It  has  since  been  found  con- 
venient to  create  a  new  chemical  laboratory,  with 
commodious  quarters  in  the  City  Hall,  to  relieve  the 
Hygienic  Institute  of  the  many  hundreds  of  ordinary 
tests  and  analyses  that  the  business  of  food  inspection 
requires.  The  special  and  critical  inquiries,  involving 
more  difficult  processes,  are  undertaken  by  the  Hy- 
gienic Institute;  while  the  chemists  who  have  their 
station  in  the  Town  Hall  cooperate  constantly  in  the 
daily  work  of  the  officers  of  food  inspection  who  are 
busy  in  the  markets,  in  the  great  new  municipal  abat- 
toirs, in  the  milk-shopsj  in  the  beer-halls  and  drinking- 
places,  and  wherever  articles  of  food  and  drink  are 
sold  to  the  Hamburg  public. 

In  the  spring  of  1893,  as  a  part  of  the  new  health 
system  of  the  Hamburg  authorities,  there  was  estab- 
lished a  harbor  sanitary  service,  with  a  chief  medical 
officer,  assistant  physicians,  and  a  staff  of  inspectors. 
Steam  and  naphtha  launches  were  provided,  and  an 
active  examination  was  begun  of  the  health  conditions 
of  all  the  ships  and  floating  craft  that  came  into  the 
port.  The  inquiry  included  the  health  of  persons  on 


CHAP.  vn. 
Bacterioi- 


tory. 


The  harbor 


408 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VII. 


Important 
results. 


New  rules 
for  practice 
of  medicine. 


Arrange- 
ments for 
cooperation 
in  aid  of  pub- 
lic health. 


board  and  the  cleanliness  and  sanitary  arrangements 
of  the  vessels.  In  the  year  1893  there  were  made  to 
sea-going  ships  not  less  than  22,640  visits,  and  to  river 
and  canal  craft  42,867  visits,  the  aggregate  number  of 
persons  on  board  being  468,000, — the  whole  number  of 
people  being  added  for  each  examination  made.  Apart 
from  the  discovery  each  year  of  some  hundreds  of 
cases  of  illness  requiring  removal  to  hospital,  this  new 
harbor  health  service  is  making  itself  particularly 
valuable  by  reason  of  its  successful  efforts  to  improve 
the  sanitary  conditions  of  emigrant-carrying  passen- 
ger ships,  of  the  quarters  occupied  by  the  crews  of 
freighting  vessels,  and  of  the  inland  craft  which  pro- 
vide the  only  home  of  thousands  of  families. 

Finally,  in  January,  1895,  there  came  into  force  a 
new  Arzte-Ordnung,  a  code  of  rules  and  regulations 
touching  the  practice  of  medicine  in  Hamburg,  and 
denning  the  duties  of  the  entire  medical  profession 
with  respect  to  the  report  of  cases  of  infectious  and 
contagious  diseases,  of  deaths,  and  of  births,  and 
otherwise  bringing  the  private  practitioners  into  rela- 
tions of  more  efficient  cooperation  with  the  public 
health  authorities.  These  regulations  are  of  an  ad- 
vanced character,  involving  some  new  methods,  and 
their  benefits  will  be  felt  in  many  directions.  The 
scheme,  among  other  things,  requires  the  medical 
practitioners  of  Hamburg  to  form  themselves  into  a 
body  and  elect  a  Chamber  of  Physicians  (Arzte-Kam- 
mer)  composed  of  fifteen  members.  This  Chamber 
will  appoint  three  of  its  members  to  represent  it  in 
the  Medicinal-Collegium  (the  public  Board  of  Health). 
The  Chamber  will  also  deliberate  and  advise  when 
questions  are  submitted  to  it  by  the  health  authorities, 
and  in  various  ways  will  bring  its  expert  knowledge 
and  ability  to  the  service  of  the  public  adminis- 
tration. 


HAMBURG  AND  ITS  SANITAEY  EEFOEMS  409 

It  is  as  yet  quite  too  soon  to  attempt  a  conclusive  pre-  CHAP.  vn. 
sentation,  in  the  form  of  vital  statistics,  of  the  results 
of  Hamburg's  new  sanitary  regime.  But  the  evidence 
afforded  by  a  comparison  of  the  death-rate  is  highly 
significant,  and  it  would  have  an  importance  even  sen- 
sational in  its  character  if  the  improvement  it  indicates 
should,-  happily,  continue  permanently.  It  would  Testimony  of 
seem  that  the  death-rate  has  declined  fully  20  per  erate. 
cent,  from  the  average  of  the  preceding  decade,  since 
the  extraordinary  precautions  of  the  cholera  summer 
of  1892  were  put  into  effect.  It  is  not  to  be  forgotten 
that  a  great  epidemic  almost  always  sweeps  away  so 
many  very  old,  very  young,  and  otherwise  specially 
susceptible  persons  that  a  subsequent  lowering  of  the 
death-rate  would  result  without  any  aid  from  better 
hygienic  surroundings..  But  when  due  allowance  is 
made  for  this  very  important  factor,  it  would  still 
seem  reasonable  to  attribute  a  considerable  part  of 
the  reduced  death-rate  of  Hamburg  to  the  city's  im- 
proved sanitary  condition.  Taking  the  period  of  thirty 
years  from  1865  to  1895,  Hamburg's  average  death- 
rate  has  declined  from  30  or  more  per  1000  per  annum 
to  20  or  less.  And  this  has  been  accomplished  in  the 
face  of  a  very  rapid  growth  of  population,  a  develop- 
ment of  the  port  as  a  great  internatignal  rendezvous, 
and  the  rise  of  an  enormous  emigration  movement 
which  has  assembled  at  Hamburg  about  a  million  per- 
sons per  decade,  many  of  them  ill-conditioned  Russian  Encouraging 
peasants.  There  will  remain  much  to  be  done  in  the 
future,  particularly  in  the  improvement  of  the  hous- 
ing conditions  of  the  poorest  third  of  the  population. 
But  with  hygienic  science  pointing  the  way  to  prac- 
tical reform,  there  will  be  no  retrogression,  but  rather 
a  constant  progress. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 


Vienna's  re- 
making 
since  1860. 


Compared 

with 
Chicago. 


IF  comparisons  were  not  of  so  little  meaning  unless 
supported  by  ample  and  precise  details,  I  should 
be  tempted  to  assert  that  the  metamorphosis  of  Vienna 
since  1860  has  been  more  remarkable  in  its  extent  and 
completeness  than  that  of  any  other  important  capital 
or  great  commercial  town  of  Europe  or  of  the  world. 
From  the  point  of  view  of  commerce  and  private  en- 
terprise, certainly  the  rebuilding  of  Chicago  and  its 
general  progress  since  the  great  fire  of  1871  would 
have  precedence.  But  when  organized  municipal  and 
social  advancement  as  well  as  physical  transformation 
and  expansion  are  considered,  Vienna  would  seem  on 
many  accounts  to  be  the  world's  most  notable  example 
of  a  splendidly  appointed  metropolis  rapidly  evolved 
through  the  adoption  of  modern  ideas  and  principles. 
If  the  municipality  of  Chicago,  after  the  fire,  had 
purchased  the  whole  tract  that  had  been  swept  clear 
of  buildings,  and  had  proceeded  to  lay  out  an  ade- 
what  Chi-  quate  central  district,  with  suitable  spaces  for  public 

cago  might      *  . 

have  done,  buildings,  with  parkways  and  public  gardens,  with  a 
broad  inner  boulevard  circle  or  ring-street,  and  with 
a  series  of  avenues  radiating  from  the  ring-street 
like  spokes  from  a  hub,  it  would  have  been  entirely 
feasible  to  sell  the  available  building  sites  front- 
ing on  this  ideal  system  of  central  open  spaces  and 
main  distributing  arteries  for  sums  large  enough  to 

410 


THE  TKANSFOKMATION  OF  VIENNA  411 

repay  the  entire  outlay,  and  perhaps  also  to  erect  a  CHAP.  vin. 
few  monumental  buildings  on  the  grounds  reserved 
for  public  edifices.  Chicago's  glimpse  of  architectu- 
ral glories  came  with  the  transient  structures  that 
made  up  the  "  White  City"  of  the  Columbian  Exhibi-  The  lesson  of 
tion.  But  on  the  tabula  rasa  of  1871  there  might  "city."1 
have  been  reserved  at  the  very  core  of  the  city  a  zone 
of  garden  spaces  in  which,  gradually,  a  series  of  mu- 
nicipal, county,  State,  and  national  edifices  could  have 
been  erected,  together  with  such  monumental  struc- 
tures as  private  beneficence  or  citizens'  associations 
might  choose  to  build  for  libraries,  science  and  art 
museums,  special  educational  purposes,  auditoriums, 
academies  of  music,  or  commercial  exchanges.  Since 
the  marvelous  creations  of  1892-93,  Chicago  has  had 
a  clear  comprehension  of  the  magnificent  effects  that 
may  be  produced  as  the  result  of  a  large  initial  plan 
which  arranges  public  edifices  with  reference  to  their 
relations  to  one  another  and  their  general  surround- 
ings. Chicago  is  inevitably  creating  its  series  of  Cbh1-c^f°-1sd 

monumental  public  edifices;  but  they  can  never  be    ingsmevit- 

47  abiy  seat- 

effectively  grouped,  with  a  due  environment  of  open       tered. 

spaces  and  park  effects,  as  they  might  easily  have 
been  if  the  strenuous  conditions  of  1871  had  permitted 
the  exercise  of  a  wise  forethought,  or  even  if  the  con- 
temporary experiences  and  policies  of  the  great  Eu- 
ropean towns  had  been  half  understood  or  appreciated 
in  America.  The  great  fire  of  London  had  come  too 
early  by  several  generations ;  and  the  modern  art  of 
city-making  played  little  part  in  the  reconstruction. 
But  Chicago  had  the  greatest  opportunity  that  has 
come  to  any  city  of  magnitude  in  our  times,  and  that 
opportunity  was  not  improved.  The  next  best  op- 
portunity that  has  come  to  any  modern  city  fell  to  v^rtunit°yP 
the  lot  of  Vienna ;  and  it  is  the  chief  part  of  my  task 
in  this  chapter  to  tell  in  a  summary  way  how  effec- 


412 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VIII. 


Vienna  the 
result  of  gov- 
ernmental 
initiative. 


The  era  of 
Francis 
Joseph. 


tively  that  opportunity  was  seized,  and  how  won- 
drously  the  city  has  been  transformed  through  the 
many-sided  impulse  to  progressive  undertaking's  that 
grew  out  of  the  plans  adopted  for  building  the  new 
metropolis.  I  would  not  for  a  moment  disparage  the 
new  Chicago,  that  marvelous  product  of  private  ini- 
tiative and  commercial  energy.  Yet  the  contrast  it 
makes  when  compared  with  the  new  Vienna  —  which 
owes  its  character  wholly  to  governmental  and  mu- 
nicipal policy,  direction,  and  vigor  —  is  for  my  pur- 
poses too  instructive  to  be  ignored.  It  would  be  gra- 
tuitous to  offer  much  censure  or  praise  in  the  case  of 
either  city.  One  is  great  chiefly  through  the  agency 
of  its  governmental  organs.  The  other  is  great  through 
the  indomitable  force  of  its  private  citizens  as  indi- 
viduals or  in  various  associated  capacities.  Each 
has  manifested  its  own  genius.  But  it  is  evident 
that  Chicago  would  have  been  the  gainer  if  it  could 
have  borrowed  some  of  Vienna's  genius  for  munici- 
pal action. 

It  was  the  political  upheaval  of  1848  and  the  events 
immediately  following  that  prepared  the  way  for  the 
new  order  of  things  in  Vienna.  The  medieval  muni- 
cipal liberties  had  long  been  lost,  and  the  citizens  were 
practically  without  voice  in  the  management  of  their 
town  affairs.  But  with  the  accession  of  the  young 
monarch  Francis  Joseph  I.  to  the  imperial  throne  of 
Austria  in  1848,  a  new  era  dawned.  The  country  was 
granted  a  liberal  constitution.  Vienna  was  named  in 
that  constitution  as  the  seat  of  government  and  the 
residence  city  of  the  sovereign.  This  act  was  soon 
followed  by  the  gift  to  the  city  of  a  municipal  con- 
stitution which  reestablished  the  local  autonomy  on 
a  broader  basis  than  any  of  the  medieval  charters 
had  afforded, — this  new  constitution  being  embodied 
in  an  imperial  statute  of  March,  1850.  It  was  not, 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  413 

however,  until  after  1860  that  the  new  municipal  gov-   CHAP.  vm. 
ernment  entered  upon  a  fully  organized  career.     It    Municipal 
engaged  the  interest  and  secured  the  zealous  service   8e  iS?rn 
of  the  best  men  in  the  professional  and  commercial 
life  of  the  city,  and  they  have  brought  its  ordinary 
administration  to  a  high  state  of  efficiency,  while 
carrying  out  extraordinary  undertakings  with  the 
most  brilliant  success. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  municipal  self- 
government  for  Vienna  has  ever  meant  any  such 
thing  as  universal  suffrage.  A  tax-paying  qualifica- 
tion  has  always  excluded  the  great  mass  of  common 
laborers.  The  minimum,  which  had  previously  been 
higher,  was  in  1885  reduced  to  five  florins.  This  limi- 
tation, together  with  that  which  requires  that  voters 
shall  be  twenty-four  years  old,  admits  to  the  munici- 
pal suffrage  about  one  person  in  twenty-five  of  the 
population,  and  excludes  more  than  three-fourths  of 
the  adult  men.  Thus  the  Vienna  electorate  is  a  body 
of  about  sixty  thousand  voters.  Regardless  of  tax-pay- 
ing, the  law  admits  various  classes  of  citizens  by 
virtue  of  their  professions  and  occupations.  First, 
however,  comes  the  list  of  men  who  hold  the  tradi- 
tional "burgher  right"  of  Vienna — a  distinction  that 
no  longer  carries  with  it  much  practical  significance. 
By  virtue  of  their  callings  are  admitted :  (1)  the  clergy 
and  all  religious  teachers;  (2)  high  officials,  active  or  men  enrolled. 
retired,  of  the  empire,  the  province,  or  the  city ;  (3) 
military  officers  and  certain  others  connected  with  the 
army ;  (4)  lawyers,  doctors,  and  pharmacists  who  have 
been  duly  graduated;  (5)  civil  engineers,  architects, 
and  other  graduates  of  technical  and  special  high 
schools;  (6)  professors  and  schoolmasters  of  all 
ranks.  These  personages,  together  with  the  citizens 
who  pay  at  least  five  florins  of  direct  taxes,  make  up 
the  body  of  voters.  But  even  this  select  body —  about 


414 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUKOPE 


CHAP.  VIII. 


The  three- 
class  system. 


Method  of 
electing 
council. 


Six-year 

terms,  and 

renewal  by 

thirds. 


sixty  thousand  men  out  of  a  total  population  ap- 
proaching a  million  and  a  half — is  subdivided  into 
three  classes  of  very  unequal  membership,  though  of 
equal  power.  The  first  class  is  composed  of  the  tax- 
payers who  pay  a  tax  of  at  least  200  florins,  the  second 
class  includes  those  whose  tax  payment  is  not  less 
than  30  florins,  and  to  the  third  class  belong  all  the 
other  voters.  This  Austrian  plan  does  not  produce  so 
great  an  inequality  among  voters  as  the  Prussian  sys- 
tem, which  gives  a  third  of  the  power  to  the  men  who 
pay  a  third  of  the  taxes.  But  it  makes  the  vote  of  a 
member  of  the  first  class  worth  three  times  as  much 
as  that  of  a  second-class  voter,  and  nearly  nine  times 
that  of  a  voter  of  the  third  class. 

Thus,  assuming  that  the  Vienna  electoral  rolls  con- 
tain 60,000  names,  we  may  in  round  figures  estimate 
4500  as  in  the  first  class,  14,500  in  the  second,  and  41,000 
in  the  third.  Vienna  is  divided  into  nineteen  perma- 
nent districts  —  bezirken  —  which  bear  an  important 
relation  to  the  carrying  out  of  all  administrative  work, 
and  which  are  also  election  districts.  The  voters  of 
each  class  in  a  given  bezirk  are  enrolled  as  a  separate 
wahlkorper,  or  voting  body.  Each  wahlkorper  directly 
elects  its  own  share  of  the  members  of  the  municipal 
council.  The  Vienna  council  is  a  body  of  138  mem- 
bers ;  and  to  each  bezirk  is  assigned  a  number  of  rep- 
resentatives that  is  divisible  by  three.  Councilors  are 
elected  for  six  years,  and  one  third  of  the  body  is  re- 
newed every  two  years.  Thus,  a  bezirk  which  is  en- 
titled to  nine  members  will  have  three  places  to  fill 
at  every  biennial  election,  and  the  voters  of  each  wahl- 
korper will  elect  one  member.  The  three  bodies  vote 
on  different  days.  For  example,  in  a  recent  election 
the  third-class  voters  in  each  bezirk  chose  their  coun- 
cilors on  October  22,  the  second-class  voters  assem- 
bled on  October  25,  and  the  first-class  voters  concluded 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  415 

the  election  on  October  29.    It  cannot  be  said  that  CHAP.  vin. 
this  three-class  system  commends  itself  seriously  to    Three-class 
the  people  of  Vienna,  and  some  day  a  democratic  wave      not  ap- 
will  sweep  it  away.    It  is  not  approved  even  by  those 
Who  belong  to  the  two  higher  categories;  but  the 
state  has  been  unwilling  to  grant  the  municipality  so 
democratic  a  measure  as  a  uniform  suffrage  for  local 
purposes,  because  there  would  inevitably  ensue  an 
agitation  for  electoral  reform  and  equal  suffrage  in 
elections  to  the  Landtag  of  Lower  Austria  and  the 
imperial  Reichsrath. 

The  electors  of  one  class  in  Vienna  not  infrequently 
choose  as  their  representative  in  the  council  some 
citizen  of  their  bezirk  who  belongs  to  another  class ; 
and  thus  the  threefold  division  does  not  make  the  character  of 

.    .       ,  .    ,  , .  .    ,  ,    ,        Vienna  coun- 

mumcipal  government  as  aristocratic  as  might  be  ciiors. 
supposed.  If,  however,  one  cares  to  use  the  word 
aristocratic  in  its  original  and  etymological  sense,  it 
may  fairly  be  applied  to  the  municipal  parliament  of 
Vienna,  for  the  gemeindesrath  of  138  members  is  a 
body  of  citizens  possessing,  upon  the  average,  a  very 
superior  qualification  for  their  public  duties.  As  in 
the  Berlin  council,  some  of  its  members  are  university 
professors  —  political  economists,  publicists,  or  scien- 
tists of  eminence ;  and,  as  in  the  London  county  coun- 
cil, some  are  statesmen  of  national  or  international 
repute.  But  the  majority  are  business  men.  The 
council  is  a  deliberative  body,  in  full  control  of  the 
general  affairs  of  the  city,  including  its  finances  and 
all  its  plans  and  policies.  Its  sessions  are  frequent 
and  open  to  the  public,  and  its  members  are  not  paid. 
It  carries  on  its  work  through  standing  committees, 
as  is  usual  with  such  bodies. 

Its  business  is  largely  influenced  and  directed,  how- 
ever, by  the  burgomaster,  who  is  its  presiding  officer  Burgomaster 

,    .         ,  ,        , ,  -i«  and  assist- 

and  is  chosen  by  the  council  from  among  its  own       ants. 


416 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VIII. 


The  "  stadt- 
rath." 


The  execu- 
tive magis- 
tracy. 


Vienna  sys- 
tem more  ap- 
plicable to 
England  or 

America 
than  Berlin 

system. 


Position  of 
the  burgo- 
master. 


members  for  a  term  of  six  years.  A  first  and  a  second 
vice-burgomaster  are  also  named  for  three-year  terms. 
Further  than  this,  the  council  selects  twenty-two  of 
its  members  who  with  the  burgomaster  and  the  two 
vice-burgomasters  form  a  stadtrafh  of  twenty-five 
members.  This  smaller  body  is  in  effect  a  large  stand- 
ing committee  of  the  full  council  whose  business  it  is 
to  carry  on  the  administration  in  matters  of  practical 
detail.  Thus  while  the  full  council  creates  offices  to 
be  filled,  the  smaller  stadtrath  selects  the  appointees. 
It  reports  everything  that  it  does  to  the  large  body, 
and  the  burgomaster  is  always  its  leading  spirit. 

The  executive  work  of  the  municipality  is  carried 
on  by  the  expert  permanent  officials  who  constitute 
the  salaried  department  chiefs  and  are  collectively 
known  as  the  magistracy.  The  burgomaster  stands 
at  the  head  of  the  civil  service,  and  the  magistrates, 
as  in  the  cities  of  Germany,  form  a  magisterial  coun- 
cil under  his  direction.  But  this  body  has  less  initia- 
tive than  the  magistracy  of  Berlin  or  the  other  Ger- 
man cities,  and  it  concerns  itself  rather  with  efficient 
executive  work  than  with  questions  of  municipal 
policy.  Thus  the  Vienna  system  with  some  modifi- 
cations might  readily  be  adopted  in  England  or  Amer- 
ica, whereas  the  Prussian  system  could  only  with 
difficulty  be  adjusted  to  the  conditions  of  the  English- 
speaking  countries.  In  England  the  aldermanic  ele- 
ment of  a  town  council  could  assume  the  duties  of 
the  Vienna  stadtrath  on  a  moment's  notice ;  while 
the  town  clerk,  the  medical  health  officer,  the  bor- 
ough surveyor  (chief  of  the  public- works  department), 
and  the  other  important  officials  and  superintendents 
of  departments  would  form  a  magisterial  corps  under 
the  mayor's  direction.  The  Vienna  burgomaster,  like 
the  mayor  of  a  French  town,  is  the  real  head  of  the 
local  administration,  and  is  a  personage  of  executive 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  417 

authority,  in  which  respect  he  differs  from  the  English  CHAP.  VIIL 
mayor.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  he  is  not  a  profes- 
sional civil  servant  like  the  burgomaster  of  a  German 
city,  but  rather  a  citizen  magistrate,  first  elected  to 
the  council  by  his  fellow-voters,  and  then  made  bur- 
gomaster by  his  fellow-councilors.  He  is  provided 
with  a  residence  in  the  City  Hall  while  he  holds  the 
post,  and  is  remunerated  to  whatever  extent  the  coun- 
cil may  choose  to  vote  him  allowances,  the  office  not 
being  a  salaried  one. 

Before  1890  Vienna  consisted  of  ten  districts  or  be- 
zirken.    In  that  year  a  great  suburban  belt  was  an-  The  nineteen 

»  ...  districts  as 

nexed,  and  a  rearrangement  of  the  divisions  was  established 
made.  There  are  now  nineteen.  The  constitution 
of  Vienna  attaches  a  high  importance  to  these  dis- 
tricts, and  their  boundaries  can  be  altered  only  by  an 
act  of  the  Austrian  parliament.  In  the  opening 
chapter  of  this  volume  I  have  commented  upon  the 
advantages  of  the  permanent  arrondissements  of  Paris 
for  the  purpose  of  localizing  administrative  work  and 
bringing  the  more  common  functions  of  municipal 
government  as  near  as  possible  to  the  people.  The 
bezirk  in  Vienna  is  still  more  strongly  marked  and  I8tratlon- 
individualized  than  the  arrondissement  in  Paris.  Each 
division  has  a  bezirlcsausschuss  (district  board),  con- 
sisting of  eighteen  members  elected  for  six  years,  each 
of  the  three  classes  of  voters  in  the  district  choosing 
six  members.  Each  district  board  chooses  a  chair- 
man or  superintendent.  The  board  has  not  a  wide  ' 
range  of  discretion  or  authority;  nevertheless  it  is 
useful  in  many  ways.  It  concerns  itself  with  the  ef- 
ficiency of  municipal  work  in  its  district,  and  affords 
an  influential  means  through  which  the  needs  of  a 
particular  locality  may  find  expression.  The  burgo- 
master has  the  right  of  the  floor  in  all  the  district 
boards,  and  members  of  the  stadtrath  often  attend 

27 


418 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VIII. 


Each  provin- 
cial diet  of 

Austria 
makes  local- 
government 
laws. 


Lower 
Austria's 
system. 


The  old 
Vienna  and 
its  girdle  of 
fortifications. 


the  local  meetings.  There  are  municipal  buildings  in 
the  different  districts,  in  which  are  maintained  the 
branch  offices  of  various  public  services  and  executive 
departments. 

It  would  not  be  easy  to  give  in  brief  outline  the 
principal  features  of  local  and  municipal  government 
for  Austria  in  general,  because  each  Landtag  or  Diet  of 
the  sixteen  provinces  which  make  up  the  Austrian  half 
of  the  Austro-Hungarian  monarchy  is  competent  to 
create  its  own  system.  Thus  the  Diet  at  Prague  con- 
trols the  Bohemian  system,  and  the  legislature  which 
meets  at  Briinn  has  exclusive  authority  over  the  local- 
government  arrangements  of  Moravia.  The  provinces 
as  a  rule  have  established  systems  which  classify  com- 
munes by  their  population  and  provide  uniform  in- 
stitutions. Lower  Austria  makes  an  exception  of 
Vienna,  which  requires  special  legislation  from  time 
to  time.  But  apart  from  one  or  two  other  towns 
which  have  special  charters,  all  the  localities  of 
Lower  'Austria  are  subject  to  the  rules  of  the  general 
municipal  code,  which  provides  for  the  election  of 
councils  and  grants  a  very  considerable  measure  of 
local  home-rule.  It  is  sufficient  for  present  purposes, 
so  far  as  Austria  is  concerned,  to  devote  our  attention 
to  the  municipal  structure  and  achievements  of  Vienna. 

When  Francis  Joseph,  then  eighteen  years  old,  came 
to  the  throne  in  1848  and  took  up  his  residence  at  Vi- 
enna, he  found  his  capital  in  a  most  uncomfortable 
plight.  The  town  itself  —  where  the  royal  establish- 
ments were  located,  where  the  nobility  and  all  the 
principal  people  lived,  and  where  all  the  business  of 
Vienna  was  transacted — occupied  a  space  of  about  one 
square  mile.  It  was  surrounded  by  massive  old  forti- 
fications, and  outside  the  walls  lay  a  broad  and  deep 
moat,  beyond  which  extended  a  belt  of  glacis  ground, 
kept  clear  of  buildings  on  military  considerations. 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  419 

On  the  outskirts  of  this  military  zone  were  thirty  or  CHAP.  vm. 
forty  forlorn  villages  which  were  beginning  to  grow        T116 

J  .  suburban 

together  and  to  form  a  continuous  mass  of  mean     villages, 
houses — and  they  were  the  worst-appointed  suburban 
neighborhoods  to  be  found  almost  anywhere  in  Eu- 
rope.    Francis  Joseph's   municipal   constitution   of 
1850,  to  which  I  have  already  referred,  united  these 
suburbs  with  the  inner  city  and  consolidated  them 
into  seven  permanent  wards  or  bezirken,  the  old  city 
forming  a  separate  bezirk.    Subsequently  a  rearrange-  Extension  of 
ment  increased  the  number  of  bezirken  to  ten,  and    Cltylmnts- 
since  the  extension  of  boundaries  accomplished  in 
1890,  an  outer  ring  of  nine  additional  bezirken  has 
been  added.    The  new  boundary  line  as  fixed  by 
Francis  Joseph  in  the  earlier  period  of  annexation 
was  an  outer  ring  of  military  defenses  that  had  been 
created  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

For  several  decades  it  had  been  felt  that  the  inner 
fortifications  were  opposing  a  most  vexatious  and 
harmful  barrier  to  traffic  and  intercourse.  The  gate- 
ways were  infrequent  and  wholly  inadequate.  Popu-  congestion 
lation  and  commerce  had  been  growing  fast,  and  w'waiis.  e 
rentals  for  the  limited  accommodations  inside  the 
walls  were  becoming  enormous.  Every  available  foot 
of  ground  was  built  upon,  new  stories  were  added  to 
old  buildings,  retail  trade  was  compelled  to  find  upper 
floors,  and  population  was  compacted  in  an  intolerable 
manner.  Under  existing  circumstances  nobody  would 
live  in  the  suburbs  who  could  live  inside  the  old  city ; 
and  only  one  remedy  for  the  situation  was  possible. 
A.  long  discussion  en'ded  in  the  memorable  order 
signed  by  the  emperor  on  December  20,  1857,  for  the 
destruction  of  the  fortifications. 

The  whole  community  now  rose  to  the  height  of  the 
great  occasion.  Vienna  was  the  most  inconvenient, 
ill-regulated,  and  unimposing  capital  in  all  Europe. 


420 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  vin.    It  had  now  an  opportunity  to  become  perhaps  the  very 
Vienna's     handsomest  and  most  convenient.     Paris  had  been 

brilliant 

opportunity,  hampered  by  the  fact  that  its  new  avenues  must  in 
great  part  be  cut  through  solidly  built  areas,  that 
its  chief  architectural  monuments  were  already  built 
or  located,  and  that  it  could  not  apply  its  art  of 
modern  city- making  upon  a  swept  area.  But  Vienna 
possessed  in  the  broad  encircling  belt  of  walls,  moat, 
and  glacis  an  area  greater  than  that  of  the  entire  inner 
city.  That  which  had  obstructed  communication  be- 
tween the  heart  of  the  metropolis  and  the  outlying 
members  was  now  to  facilitate  it.  The  walls  were  to 
be  removed,  the  moat  filled  up,  and  the  space  thus 
gained,  together  with  the  broad  glacis  belt,  was  to  be 
laid  off  in  streets,  building  sites,  and  public  gardens  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  make  intercourse  between  the 
central  and  the  outer  districts  as  free  as  possible. 

The  whole  arrangement  was  planned  systematically; 
and  in  the  two  or  three  years  that  were  required  for 
demolition  and  the  clearing  and  leveling  of  the  zone, 
the  most  talented  landscapists  and  architects  of  the 
day  were  engaged  upon  competitive  plans  for  the  final 
laying  out  of  the  ground.  One  might  easily  make  a 
long  story  of  this  stadt-erweiterung  project;  but  it 
must  suffice  here  to  present  the  summary  results. 
The  central  feature  of  the  plans  that  were  adopted  was 
a  great  encircling  street,  the  so-called  Riug-strasse.  It 
is  in  fact  a  polygon  rather  than  a  circle  that  the  Ring- 
strasse  describes,  its  angles  —  which  are  not  entirely 
regular  —  giving  it  an  octagonal  appearance.  Upon 
this  broad  and  elaborately  constructed  thoroughfare 
was  made  to  front  a  series  of  gardens  and  open  park 
spaces ;  and  roomy  sites  were  reserved  for  a  number 
of  great  public  buildings.  The  ground  that  remained 
was  laid  off  in  regular  cross  streets  and  parallel  streets, 
and  building  sites  were  sold  to  private  purchasers. 


A  system- 
atic plan. 


The  Ring- 
strasse. 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 


421 


After  some  preliminary  difficulty  touching  matters  of 
detail,  there  was  generous  cooperation  between  the 
imperial  and  the  municipal  governments  in  the  great 
task  of  transforming  Vienna;  but  the  particular 
scheme  known  as  the  stadt-erweiterung  was  taken  in 
hand  and  administered  by  a  commission  appointed  by 
the  emperor  and  accountable  to  the  central  govern- 
ment. The  fortifications  themselves  were  unquestion- 
ably the  property  of  the  general  government,  although 
there  was  room  for  a  difference  of  view  concerning  the 
reversionary  title  to  the  glacis  ground.  In  any  case  the 
city  council  argued  that  street  plans  and  improvements 
were  properly  a  municipal  function,  and  that  the  busi- 
ness should  be  delegated  to  the  city  authorities.  The 
emperor,  however,  was  firm,  and  the  council  yielded 
gracefully. 

Everybody  in  Vienna  has  long  ago  admitted  the 
wisdom  of  the  emperor's  policy.  He  saw  clearly  that 
the  best  service  he  could  render  the  city  authorities 
themselves  would  be  to  relieve  them  of  responsibility 
for  the  special  and  extraordinary  task  of  constructing 
the  new  zone,  in  order  that  they  might  be  free  to  de- 
vote their  energies  to  a  hundred  other  important 
tasks  which  needed  concurrent  attention.  The  prestige 
of  the  imperial  commission,  moreover,  made  it  easily 
possible  to  carry  out  a  liberal  policy  which  the  town 
council  could  hardly  have  ventured  to  pursue.  The 
land  comprised  in  the  cleared  zone  was  so  valuable 
that  it  might  have  seemed  extravagant  on  the  part  of 
an  elected  citizens'  body  to  devote  so  much  of  it  to  or- 
namental and  unproductive  public  purposes.  It  is  not 
conceivable  that  the  gemeindesrath  would  have  been 
able  to  agree  upon  so  splendid  a  plan  as  that  of  the 
imperial  commission.  But  a  more  niggardly  plan 
would  have  been  a  less  successful  financial  policy  in 
the  end.  It  was  simply  the  emperor's  object  to  make 

27* 


CHAP.  VIII. 


The  project 

managed 
by  imperial 
authorities. 


A  wise 
policy. 


Town  coun- 
cil could  not 
have  adopted 
so  liberal 
a  plan. 


422  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  ETJEOPE 

CHAP.  viii.    the  improvement  scheme  self-sustaining,  on  as  magnif- 
icent a  scale  as  possible.    About  four  fifths  of  the  en- 
tire area  was  retained  for  public  uses,  and  the  remain- 
Fund  from    ing  one  fifth  was  sold  as  building  sites  to  private 

sale  of  build-          ' 

ing  sites,  purchasers  for  a  sum  that  has  been  stated  in  round 
figures  at  200,000,000  florins — about  $80,000,000.  Out 
of  that  fund  the  commission  made  new  streets  and 
sewers  and  proceeded  to  erect  a  series  of  public  build- 
ings which  —  with  those  built  by  the  city  and  other 
public  authorities  on  sites  provided  by  the  commission 
—  now  render  the  Vienna  Ring-strasse  the  most  im- 
posing street  in  the  world.  Such  a  sum  would  not 
build  many  Albany  capitols,  New  York  court-houses, 
or  Philadelphia  city  halls ;  but  public  buildings  are 
less  expensive  in  Austria.  Eighty  million  dollars  is 
a  vast  sum  in  Vienna;  and  when  expended  upon  pub- 
lic edifices  and  their  artistic  adornment  with  the  en- 
lightened taste,  constructive  skill,  and  administrative 
honesty  and  thrift  which  characterize  that  city,  noble 
Harmonious  results  might  well  be  expected.  The  architectural 
llts'  character  of  all  private  construction  upon  the  erweiter- 
ungs-grund  was  strictly  regulated  in  the  interest  of  har- 
mony, and  nothing  mars  the  symmetry  of  the  whole, 
or  detracts  from  the  effect  of  sumptuousness  and  mag- 
nificence. 

The  new  monumental  structures  facing  upon  the 
The  great    Riug-strasse  include  the  Rathhaus  (city  hall),  a  sur- 
^onnments1  Passingty  beautiful  specimen  of  the  modern  Gothic, 
onstrass«ng    °Pened  iQ  1885;  the  Austrian  parliament  buildings, 
in  pure  Grecian  style,  opened  in  1883 ;  the  main  build- 
ing of  the  University  of  Vienna,  a  magnificent  Renais- 
sance structure,  completed  in  1884;  the  royal  theater, 
unequaled  in  Europe,  and  opened  in  1888;  the  Votive 
church,  finished  about  1870;  the  palace  of  justice, 
opened  in  1882;  the  imperial  museums  of  art  and 
science,  two  magnificent  Renaissance  buildings,  opened 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  423 

since  1890,  between  which,  with  ample  space  for  effect,  CHAP.  vm. 
is  the  colossal  monument  to  Maria  Theresa ;  the  new 
imperial  palace,  not  yet  finished ;  the  imperial  opera- 
house,  finished  before  1870;  various  palaces,  museums, 
art  schools,  garrison  and  arsenal  buildings,  and  showy 
structures  for  commercial-exchange  or  other  business 
purposes.  The  Ring-strasse  has  been  criticized  as 
grouping  together  too  many  magnificent  structures  toucwngthe 
in  different  styles  of  architecture,  the  individual  build- 
ings thus  failing  to  produce  the  full  impression  they 
might  convey  if  more  entirely  isolated.  I  am  not 
disposed  to  think  that  the  facts  justify  the  criticism, 
in  view  of  the  generous  garden  spaces  which  give  each 
great  structure  an  ample  approach.  But  it  is  not 
with  questions  of  pure  taste  in  architecture  that  this 
particular  survey  of  the  new  Vienna  is  concerned. 
It  is  enough  for  me  to  remark  that  the  beautiful  Ring- 
strasse,  nearly  two  hundred  feet  wide,  is  lined  with 
the  most  imposing  array  of  modern  structures  to  be 
found  anywhere  in  the  world,  although  the  street  was 
not  opened  until  1865. 

The  magical  transformation  that  the  erweiterungs- 
fund  has  been  enabled  to  bring  about  might  well  fur- 
nish the  land-nationalization  advocates  with  an  illus- 
tration of  the  possibilities  that  lie  dormant  in  the 
"  unearned  increment."  The  little  fraction  of  the  old 
fortification-  and  parade-grounds  that  the  government 
sold  to  private  buyers  had  apparently  sufficed  to  cover 
the  rest  of  the  area  with  beautiful  streets,  incomparable 
public  edifices,  and  charming  gardens  adorned  with 
fountains  and  statues,  in  which  are  open-air  concerts 
free  to  all  the  people,  besides  refreshment  pavilions 
and  much  else  to  afford  popular  entertainment ;  and 
still  there  remain,  it  is  said,  some  millions  of  florins 
in  the  unexhausted  erweiterungs-fund  !  It  is  not  true, 
however,  that  this  fund  has  paid  nearly  all  the  bills 


424 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  VIII. 

The  fund  did 
not  pay  all 

the  bills. 


Impetus  to 
private  con- 
struction. 


Remarkable 
policy  of 
exemption 
from  taxes. 


for  Vienna's  remaking.  The  municipal  treasury  has 
shared  in  much  of  the  cost  of  streets  and  public  works, 
and  it  paid  for  the  city  hall  j  while  the  imperial  Aus- 
trian government  and  the  provincial  authorities  of 
Lower  Austria  have  also  borne  the  cost  of  placing 
their  own  structures  upon  the  sites  that  the  erwei- 
terung  project  freely  assigned  them.  But  the  im- 
pulse proceeded,  nevertheless,  from  the  imperial  pol- 
icy and  its  shrewd  and  attractive  methods  for  securing 
cooperation  in  all  directions. 

If  the  project  had  only  succeeded  in  arousing  the 
municipal,  provincial,  and  national  authorities  to  a 
large  participation  in  the  making  of  a  new  metropolis, 
but  had  not  also  awakened  the  enthusiasm  and  stim- 
ulated the  activity  of  private  builders,  it  would  have 
fallen  far  short  of  its  full  purpose.  What  Vienna 
needed  more  than  monumental  edifices  was  proper 
house-room  for  its  rapidly  growing  population,  and 
accommodation  for  its  merchants  and  traders.  In 
fact  the  erweiterung  improvements  gave  a  tremendous 
impetus  to  private  construction,  not  only  on  what  was 
known  as  the  erweiterungs-gruud,  but  also  in  other 
parts  of  the  city.  Several  magnificent  new  suburbs 
were  built,  in  sharp  contrast  with  the  prevailing  mean- 
ness of  the  suburban  architecture  of  the  previous  pe- 
riod. All  this  building  activity  was  greatly  accelerated, 
if  not  chiefly  prompted,  by  laws  exempting  new  houses 
from  taxation.  Thirty  years'  exemption  was  granted 
those  buildings  erected  in  the  first  five  years  upon  the 
erweiterungs-grund,  and  twenty-five  years'  was  al- 
lowed in  case  of  buildings  completed  in  the  next  five 
years.  These  conditions  naturally  gave  an  enhanced 
value  to  the  sites  that  the  commission  offered  for  sale, 
and  helped  to  swell  the  accruing  fund.  But  shorter 
exemptions  were  also  extended  to  all  parts  of  the 
city, —  the  period  being  from  fifteen  to  eighteen  years, 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 


425 


according  to  the  promptness  with  which  the  work  was 
taken  in  hand  and  accomplished.  From  time  to  time 
these  encouragements  were  renewed  for  the  benefit 
of  subsequent  builders,  although  the  period  of  ex- 
emption was  finally  reduced  to  twelve  years.  In  a 
city  like  Vienna,  where  the  taxes  upon  a  house  are 
expected  to  amount  to  about  half  the  rent,  such  ex- 
emptions constitute  a  most  substantial  bonus;  and 
inasmuch  as  the  inducement  was  applied  also  to  any 
considerable  enlargement  and  improvement  of  houses 
already  existing,  it  may  easily  be  believed  that  the 
result  was  an  almost  entire  reconstruction  of  the 
city.  The  situation  afforded  an  opportunity  for  the 
shifting  of  population  from  the  interior  to  the  outer 
bezirken,  and  the  commercial  structures  of  the  inte- 
rior were  very  generally  rebuilt  or  improved.  On 
the  erweiterungs-grund  the  banking  and  monetary 
institutions  promptly  undertook  or  fostered  large 
building  operations,  and  a  great  number  of  joint- 
stock  building  companies  began  to  vie  with  each 
other  in  the  speculative  erection  of  buildings  in  all 
parts  of  Vienna, — their  shares  being  listed  on  the 
Bourse  and  bought  and  sold  every  day.  The  reac- 
tion carne  in  1873,  when  many  companies  and  indi- 
vidual speculators  failed.  But  meanwhile  the  city 
had  been  marvelously  and  permanently  altered  for 
the  better. 

The  authorities  had  made  the  most  exacting  regula- 
tions as  to  the  character  of  new  buildings,  and 
nowhere  else,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  has  recent  con- 
struction been  so  solid  and  durable.  Stone  staircases 
to  the  very  top  floor,  great  strength  of  walls  and 
floor-joists,  double  fire-walls,  good  provision  for  air 
and  light,  prohibition  of  garret  and  cellar  residences, 
proper  connection  with  the  city's  new  water-supply 
and  new  sewers, — these  and  other  requirements 


CHAP.  VIII. 

Extended  to 

all  parts  of 

the  city. 


The  city  re- 
constructed. 


An  era  of 

building 

speculation. 


Stringent 

building 

regulations. 


426  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  viii.  having  to  do  with  safety  and  health  were  joined  with 
similarly  strict  rules  regarding  street-lines,  balconies, 
height  and  generally  harmonious  appearance  of  fa- 
9ades,  to  make  a  building  law  of  the  most  Draco- 
nian description.  Now  that  the  city  has  extended 
its  limits  very  greatly,  these  building  regulations  have 
been  somewhat  modified  in  their  application  to  the 
smaller  class  of  houses  built  upon  side  streets  in 
outlying  neighborhoods;  but  they  remain  stringent. 
A  high  authority  in  Vienna  has  told  me  that  in  his 
opinion  the  building  laws  are  too  severe  because  tend- 
ing to  make  rents  excessively  high  for  poor  families. 
But  I  doubt  the  correctness  of  his  view,  whether  as  a 
general  statement  or  as  a  particular  Viennese  obser- 
vation. If  in  these  chapters  on  European  cities  I 
have  devoted  much  space  to  official  demolitions  and 
value  of  the  interferences  that  are  involved  in  a  wholesale 

measures,  reconstruction  by  public  authorities  of  the  dwellings 
of  the  people,  it  is  not  because  these  undertakings 
seem  to  me  desirable  in  themselves.  It  is  to  obviate 
the  necessity  for  them  that  the  best  possible  building 
regulations  ought  everywhere  to  be  put  in  force. 
The  relief  of  the  inner  bezirk  from  its  choked 

Relief  of  the  and  congested  state,  which  followed  the  removal  of 

mner  city,  ^g  barriers>  the  construction  of  great  business  blocks 
upon  the  Ring-strasse  and  the  other  new  streets,  and 
the  outflow  of  trade  and  population  over  a  widened 
area,  made  it  feasible  to  reform  the  tangled  street 
system  of  the  "  old  Vienna."  Many  of  the  interior 
thoroughfares  were  broadened  and  straightened,  new 
paving  was  laid  after  the  new  sewers  had  been  duly 
constructed,  and  the  renovated  Innere  Stadt  entered 
upon  a  new  era  of  business  prosperity. 

The  outer  street  system  also  was  revised  and 
improved.  The  thirty-four  gemeinden  or  village  com- 
munities which  had  been  annexed,  consolidated,  and 


THE  TEANSFOEMATION  OF  VIENNA  427 

arranged  as  the  nine  environing  wards  or  bezirken,  CHAP.  vni. 
and  which  contained  four  fifths  of  the  population,  The  outlying 
had  sprung  up  originally  on  the  lines  of  country 
roads  approaching  the  old  town ;  and  these  several 
haupt -strassen  or  main  roads  were  now  developed  into 
great  radial  thoroughfares,  pouring  their  streams  of 
traffic  into  the  broad  Ring-strasse,  upon  which  the 
influx  could  easily  be  distributed.  These  roads  had 
formerly  been  almost  impassable  for  the  mud  in 
winter  and  the  dust  in  summer ;  but  they  were  now 
well  paved,  well  sewered,  well  lighted,  and  in  all 
respects  arranged  as  convenient  highways  of  commu- 
nication between  the  center  and  the  suburbs.  Per- 
haps no  other  city  of  equal  size  is  so  conveniently 
appointed  as  regards  the  daily  movement  of  popula- 
tion to  and  from  the  center  as  the  new  Vienna, 
Nearly  all  important  institutions, — parliament,  law- 
courts,  university  and  other  educational  establish- 
ments, central  post-office,  bourse,  municipal  and 
administrative  buildings,  imperial  establishments, 
officers'  barracks,  chief  theaters,  cafes,  and  places  of 
resort  and  amusement, —  with  banks  and  leading 
business  establishments,  are  either  in  or  near  the 
Ring-strasse;  while  the  inner  district  is  full  of 
business  establishments  of  every  character.  The 
network  of  streets  in  the  old  town  connects  at 
perhaps  forty  points  with  the  Ring,  while  the  series 
of  about  fifteen  main  radials  extending  outward 
(of  course  these  are  not  geometrically  regular), 
draw  from  the  Ring  and  empty  into  it  as  from  a 
great  receiving  and  distributing  reservoir.  Blockades 
and  obstruction  are  practically  impossible  with  this 
street  system. 

The  street  railways  do  not  invade  the  inner  city, 
but  all  their  operations  center  upon  the  Ring.  The 
incomer  on  any  given  spoke  is  carried  along  the 


428  MUNICIPAL  GOVEKNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  vm.   perimeter  of    the  hub  until  he   reaches  the  point 
Arrange-     nearest  his  destination,  and  in  like  manner  when 

mentof  / 

street-rail-  returning  he  enters  his  car  at  any  point  on  the 
Ring  and  is  carried  around  to  the  desired  radial  and 
thence  outward.  There  has  more  recently  been  built 
a  great  outer  concentric  street,  the  so-called  Gilrtel- 
strasse  (girdle  street),  folio  wing  the  line  of  the  boundary 
defenses ;  and  upon  this  street  there  is  also  operated  a 
street-railway  line  that  crosses  the  radials  and  forms 
a  harmonious  part  of  the  general  system.  With  the 
growth  of  the  city,  leading  up  to  the  annexation 
in  1890  of  another  wide  zone  lying  beyond  the  Gurtel- 
strasse,  the  transit  system  has  been  further  extended 
to  accommodate  the  half  million  people  in  the  newer 
suburbs. 

There  has  now  been  projected  by  the  municipal 

Projected     authorities  a  rapid-transit  system  to  consist  in  part  of 

rapid-transit  .,  ...  />      i      .    •      T  I-T 

system,  steam  railways  and  in  part  of  electric  lines,  which 
will  connect  the  stations  of  the  existing  railway  lines 
and  give  the  metropolis  a  service  of  fast  trains 
extending  to  all  its  parts.  The  electric  lines  will 
cross  the  inner  city  at  right  angles,  and  there  will  be 
an  inner  circuit,  with  nine  or  ten  stations  (running 
parallel  with  the  Ring-strasse,  but  at  a  little  distance 
outside  of  it),  with  about  half  a  dozen  lines  radiating 
from  it,  not  to  mention  an  outer  circuit  known  as  the 
giirtel  line.  The  project  includes  still  other  circuit 
and  single  lines,  and  the  system  is  to  be  constructed 
gradually  during  a  period  of  years, — although  a 
considerable  part  of  it  has  been  marked  for  comple- 
tion before  the  beginning  of  1898. 

The  Vienna  Tramway  Company,  which  operates 
almost  the  entire  ordinary  street-railway  system,  has  a 
franchise  that  was  in  1887  extended  to  the  end  of  the 
year  1925,  in  consideration  of  large  money  payments  to 
the  municipal  treasury  and  various  agreements  favor- 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA  429 

able  to  the  community.    The  company  runs  working-  CHAP.  vm. 

men's  cars  morning  and  evening  with  reduced  fares,  street-raii- 

0                                                  *  a    far 

makes  special  concessions  to  school  children,  provides 


methods. 

transfer  or  "  correspondence"  tickets,  and  arranges 
all  its  numerous  radial  lines  on  a  zone  system  with  a 
charge  of  5  kreutzers  (equal  to  an  English  penny  or  two 
American  cents)  for  each  zone.  A  10-kreutzer  fare 
(equal  to  4  cents)  pays  for  a  ride  regardless  of  the  num- 
ber of  zones,  and  entitles  to  a  transfer  ticket  for  any 
part  of  Vienna.  Four  kreutzers  (equal  to  If  American 
cents)  is  the  price  of  a  workingman's  ride,  regardless  working- 
of  distance,  in  the  special  laborers'  cars.  The  public  metic8kets?ap 
authorities  have  a  voice  in  the  fixing  of  fares  and 
exercise  a  general  oversight.  The  system  as  a  whole 
is  a  remarkably  complete  and  symmetrical  one,  and 
its  able  management  suggests  that  of  Berlin.  "When 
the  municipal  rapid-transit  system  is  superadded, 
Vienna  will  be  exceptionally  well  supplied  with  means 
of  communication. 

The  various  public  works  that  belong  to  the  period 
of  Vienna's  reconstruction  cannot  even  be  catalogued      j^^ 
in  this  rapid  sketch  ;  but  some  of  the  most  important    terminals. 
should  be  recounted.    This  was  the  era  of  railway 
building  ;  and  the  Austrian  state  system  established 
its  terminals,  bridged  the  Danube,  and  contributed  to 
the  city's  development.      One  of  the  largest  of  the 
municipal    undertakings   was    the   improvement   of 
Danube  navigation.    The  natural  course  of  the  great 
stream  as  it  flows  across  Lower  Austria  is  through 

,.,,,.  Danube  im- 

extensive  marshes,  which  allow  it  no  well-defined  provement. 
banks;  and  there  are  in  some  places  a  dozen  chan- 
nels winding  among  low  islands  which  are  at  times 
completely  submerged.  Such  was  the  character  of 
the  Danube  in  the  vicinity  of  Vienna,  where  its  course 
lay  several  miles  'east  of  the  old  city,  describing  an 
outward  curve.  A  vast  sum  of  money  was  success- 


430 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


Encourage- 
ment of 
commerce. 


CHAP.  VIIL  fully  expended  in  cutting  a  straight  new  channel 
which  brings  the  river  much  nearer  the  city,  gives  it 
proper  depth  and  definite  banks,  makes  good  landing- 
places  feasible,  and  permits  the  railway  system  to 
operate  a  shore-line  and  to  make  convenient  freight 
transfers  with  the  two  hundred  steamers  and  the 
eight  hundred  great  barges  operated  by  the  Danube 
Steam  Navigation  Company.  The  municipality  and 
the  general  government  have  done  everything  in  their 
power  to  promote  the  railway  and  shipping  interests 
which  have  their  terminals  along  the  new  Danube 
channel ;  and  the  town  itself  maintains,  among  other 
ventures,  a  great  storage  warehouse  in  which  it  rents 
space  to  merchants  or  other  shippers.  The  Danube 
canal  which  passes  through  the  heart  of  the  city,  and 
the  Wein-fluss,  a  swift  stream  from  the  neighboring 
hills,  both  required  the  expenditure  of  large  sums 
for  embankments,  regulation  of  flow,  and  numerous 
permanent  bridges.  Several  great  Danube  bridges 
were  also  built  as  a  part  of  the  city's  program  of 
expansion. 

Sanitary  reforms,  meanwhile,  went  hand  in  hand 
with  schemes  for  the  adornment  and  the  commercial 
development  of  the  city.  The  greatest  of  the  public- 
health  projects  was  that  of  a  new  water-supply. 
Vienna  was  ill  supplied  with  good  drinking-water, 
and  forms  of  disease  that  are  propagated  by  contam- 
inated water  were  prevalent.  Typhus,  cholera,  and 
other  infectious  diseases  found  Vienna  peculiarly 
congenial.  A  magnificent  supply  of  water  was  intro- 
duced, at  the  cost  of  many  millions  of  florins,  from 
great  springs  in  the  Alps,  eighty  miles  distant.  The 
quality  of  this  water  is  perhaps  superior  to  that  which 
any  other  large  city  in  the  world  furnishes  to  its 
people.  In  the  decade  1848-57  the  average  yearly 
death-rate  of  Vienna  was  only  a  fraction  less  than  42 


Bridge 
building. 


The  Alpine 
water- 
supply. 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 


431 


per  1000.  The  Alpine  water  was  first  introduced  in 
1873.  For  the  decade  from  1878  to  1888  the  average 
yearly  death-rate  was  28.57.  This  improved  showing 
was  due  in  no  small  part  to  the  pure  mountain  water, 
which  has  not  lent  itself  to  the  spread  of  cholera, 
typhoid,  or  other  disease  germs. 

The  Alpine  water  system,  however,  did  not  stand 
alone  as  a  sanitary  reform.  The  sewer  system  was 
thoroughly  rearranged,  and  main  drainage-tunnels 
were  constructed  by  means  of  which  the  entire  sewage 
of  the  city  was  conveyed  to  a  point  below  the  city  and 
there  discharged  into  the  Danube.  Vienna's  hygienic 
and  administrative  experts  have  satisfied  themselves 
that  where  a  city's  sewage  can  be  swept  away  by  a 
large  stream  like  the  Danube,  no  profitable  use  can  be 
made  of  it  for  fertilizing  the  soil.  A  Berlin  or  a 
Birmingham  must  of  necessity  provide  sewage-farms. 
But  when  a  great  stream  with  sufficient  current,  or  the 
adjacent  sea,  can  be  made  the  receptacle,  it  seems  to 
have  been  everywhere  found  more  economical  to  throw 
away  the  manurial  elements  of  sewage  than  to  use 
them.  Perhaps  this  conclusion  may  be  changed  by 
future  experience  or  new  discoveries. 

Approved  methods  of  sanitary  administration  were 
introduced,  and  great  hospitals  for  infectious  diseases 
were  built.  The  whole  question  of  food-supply  was 
brought  under  very  active  municipal  supervision. 
The  authorities  created  great  public  slaughter-houses 
and  cattle-yards,  and  were  soon  able  not  only  to  make 
it  certain  that  the  supply  of  animal  food  was  in 
wholesome  condition,  but  also  to  make  the  price  of 
meat  much  cheaper  than  it  had  been.  A  system  of 
municipal  wholesale  and  retail  markets  was  also  pro- 
vided, with  excellent  appointments  and  with  the  pur- 
pose of  improving  the  quality  and  cheapening  the 
price  of  all  the  staple  articles  of  food  required  in 


CHAP.  VIII. 


Improve- 
ment in  gen- 
eral health. 


Sewers  and 
sewage 
disposal. 


Various 
sanitary 
reforms. 


432 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  vm.  Vienna.  This  series  of  measures  has  undoubtedly 
aided  in  the  remarkable  improvement  that  has  taken 
place  in  the  general  health.  The  municipal  cemetery 
arrangements  were  modernized  and  developed.  Street 
cleansing  and  general  scavenging  were  accorded  a 
place  of  dignity  and  importance  in  the  municipal 
housekeeping.  A  great  establishment  was  created 
for  the  healthful  and  economical  disposition  of  dead 
animals ;  and  it  produces  fertilizers  and  various  minor 
products,  such  as  glue  and  plasterers'  supplies,  the 
whole  undertaking  being  an  example  of  the  municipal 
economies  that  are  likely  everywhere  to  assume  a 
considerable  importance  in  years  to  come.  Whereas 
the  Vienna  death-rate  before  1860  was  above  40  per 
1000,  it  is  now  not  more  than  24.  In  1892  it  was  24.3, 
in  1893  it  had  fallen  to  exactly  24,  and  in  1894  to  22.8. 
This,  as  compared  with  conditions  prevailing  some 
thirty  years  earlier,  means  a  saving  of  more  than 

Good  effect   twenty  thousand  lives  each  year,  an  avoidance  (accord- 

of  health       .  •iiii/v.BV'ui 

measures,  ing  to  the  most  careful  calculations)  of  probably  more 
than  six  hundred  thousand  cases  of  illness,  and  an 
incalculably  valuable  conservation  of  the  productive 
and  economic  as  well  as  the  civilizing  forces  of  the 
community. 

The  new  era  has  witnessed  the  creation  in  Vienna 
of  a  very  remarkable  educational  system,  with  the 
erection  of  nearly  a  hundred  large  structures  in  the 
bezirken  for  purposes  of  elementary  instruction,  and 

organization  the  establishment  of  a  great  number  of  institutions 

of  school  .  ° 

system,  for  secondary  and  special  education.  There  is  a  gen- 
eral school-board  for  administrative  purposes,  partly 
appointed  by  the  municipal  authorities  and  partly 
delegated  from  the  nineteen  bezirken  school-boards. 
In  each  bezirk  the  voters  elect  a  group  of  school 
directors  who  serve,  with  several  appointed  members, 
upon  the  neighborhood  school-board.  The  financial 


THE  TRANSFORMATION  OF  VIENNA 


433 


control  of  the  system  is  vested  in  the  city  council,  and 
the  burgomaster  is  at  the  head  of  the  school  adminis- 
tration. But  the  neighborhood  elective  boards  enlist 
the  aid  and  interest  of  a  large  number  of  citizens,  and 
the  schools  are  enthusiastically  supported. 

Public  charity,  also,  while  centrally  organized 
through  the  regular  municipal  government,  has  its 
ordinary  and  practical  work  carried  out  in  the  several 
bezirken  by  means  of  local  boards,  the  members  of 
which  are  in  large  part  directly  elected  by  the  voters 
of  the  district.  It  will  not  be  necessary  to  describe 
in  detail  a  system  of  poor  relief  and  medical  aid 
which  is  marked  rather  by  good  organization  and 
satisfactory  results  than  by  any  very  novel  principles 
or  methods. 

I  have  already  intimated  that  the  architectural 
expansion  of  Vienna  was  attended  and  in  large  part 
caused  by  a  rapid  access  of  population.  Between 
1860  and  1890  the  number  of  people  within  the 
boundaries  had  grown  from  500,000  to  800,000,  while 
outside  the  external  line  of  fortifications  a  new  series 
of  suburbs  had  grown  up  which  in  1890  were  found 
to  contain  nearly  half  a  million  inhabitants.  Many 
good  reasons  were  adduced  why  these  neighborhoods 
ought  to  be  incorporated  with  Vienna.  The  boundary 
lines  were  accordingly  extended  to  include  them;  and 
the  new  municipal  area  comprises  nearly  seventy 
square  miles,  the  old  limits  (before  1890)  having 
included  only  about  twenty-one  square  miles.  The 
population  of  Vienna  in  1895  may  be  conserva- 
tively estimated  at  1,500,000.  Decentralizing  tenden- 
cies in  Austria,  several  periods  of  severe  business 
depression  from  which  recovery  has  been  slow  and 
painful,  the  growth  of  the  Hungarian  railway  system 
and  of  Budapest  at  its  center,  with  other  causes  that  I 
will  not  attempt  to  enumerate,  have  seemed  of  late 


CHAP.  VIII. 


Neighbor- 
hood boards. 


The  work 

of  relief  and 

charity. 


Growth  of 
population. 


Depressing 
tendencies. 


28 


434 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


The  saving 
fact  in  the 
situation. 


CHAP.  viii.  somewhat  to  becloud  the  once  brilliant  prospects 
of  Vienna.  It  is  now  clearly  evident  to  my  mind  that 
if  it  had  not  been  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  city  and 
its  entire  transformation  under  the  impulse  of  the 
erweiterungs-project,  Vienna  would  now  be  in  a  very 
critical  commercial  condition,  if  not  in  a  hopelessly 
disastrous  one.  But  these  great  reforms,  coming  at 
a  time  when  a  happy  conjunction  of  circumstances 
favored  their  execution  on  a  bold  and  courageous 
plan,  have  given  Vienna  an  assured  position  that 
no  political  misfortune  or  new  commercial  rivalry  can 
take  away. 

My  praise  of  the  Vienna  municipality,  and  of  the 
efficient  and  intelligent  conduct  of  its  affairs,  has 
been  based  upon  the  unalterable  record  of  its  charac- 
ter and  its  performances  during  a  period  of  liberal 
government  lasting  through  nearly  a  quarter  of  a 
century.  The  political  reactions  of  1894  and  1895 
have  made  upheavals,  the  results  of  which  it  is  too 
early  to  forecast.  The  wave  of  anti-semitism  has 
for  the  moment  overwhelmed  the  liberal  majority  in 
the  municipal  council  of  Vienna,  and  the  antago- 
nisms of  race  and  religion  seem  to  threaten  the  best 
interests  of  the  school  system,  and  in  other  ways 
promise  to  disturb  the  reasonable  and  harmonious 
working  of  the  city's  administrative  departments. 
But  I  cannot  believe  that  the  anti-liberal  and  anti- 
semite  victory  of  the  autumnal  municipal  campaign 
of  1895,  and  the  new  policy  thus  sanctioned,  repre- 
sent the  deliberate  purpose  of  the  people  of  Vienna. 


Political  re 
action  of 
1894-95. 


CHAPTER  IX 

BUDAPEST:   THE    RISE   OF  A   NEW 
METROPOLIS 

TO  the  world  at  large,  Budapest,  the  capital  and 
metropolis  of  Hungary,  is  the  least  known  of  all 
the  important  cities  of  Europe.  No  other  falls  so  far 
short  of  the  appreciation  it  merits.  Several  reasons 
may  be  assigned  for  this  comparative  obscurity; 
among  which  are  remoteness  from  the  chief  thorough-  has  not  been 

°  °         appreciated. 

fares  of  travel  and  commerce,  the  isolation  of  the 
Magyar  language  and  literature,  and  the  subordination 
of  all  things  Hungarian  to  the  Austrian  name  and 
fame.  But  the  most  important  reason  is  the  simplest 
of  all:  the  Budapest  of  to-day  is  so  new  that  the 
world  has  not  had  time  to  make  its  acquaintance.  Its 
people  justly  claim  for  it  the  most  rapid  growth  in 
recent  years  of  all  the  European  capitals,  and  are  fond 
of  likening  its  wonderful  expansion  to  that  of  Chicago 
and  other  newly-created  American  cities. 
.  When  Kossuth  found  refuge  in  America  after  Hun- 
gary's tragical  struggle  for  independence,  the  sister 
towns  of  Buda  and  Pest,  lying  on  opposite  sides  of 
the  Danube,  together  had  hardly  more  than  a  hun-  Growthsince 

,  *,.  ..,.          themiddleof 

dred  thousand  people.  The  consolidated  municipality  the  century. 
had  by  the  census  of  1891  a  population  of  more  than 
half  a  million.  But  remarkable  as  is  the  increase  of 
population,  it  seems  to  me  far  less  remarkable  than 
the  physical  and  architectural  transformations  that 
have  accompanied  the  town's  growth  in  numbers. 

435 


436  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  Budapest  is  not  merely  four  or  five  times  as  populous 
as  it  was  in  the  middle  of  the  current  century,  but  it 
has  blossomed  out  of  primitive  and  forlorn  conditions 
into  the  full  magnificence  of  a  splendidly  appointed 
modern  metropolis.  Rapidly  developing  cities  usually 
A  finely  have  the  misf  ortune  to  grow  wronglv.  through  lack 

appointed  .  '  .  ' 

city-  of  foresight  and  wise  regulations  on  the  part  of  the 
governing  authorities.  Budapest  has  not  wholly 
escaped;  but  it  would  be  hard  to  find  another  large 
town  whose  development  has  been  kept  so  well  in 
hand  by  the  authorities,  and  has  been  so  symmetrical 
and  scientific  from  the  point  of  view  of  approved  city- 
making.  In  many  particulars  of  appointment,  as 
well  as  in  general  plan  and  tout  ensemble,  American 
cities  might  learn  not  a  little  from  Budapest. 

Political  reasons  have  quite  as  much  to  do  as  com- 
mercial causes  with  the  making  and  unmaking  of 
The  play  of  European  cities.     Thus  Vienna,  which  may  well  con- 

political 

forces.  test  with  Paris  the  claim  to  preeminence  for  beauty 
and  splendor,  owes  almost  everything,  as  I  have  shown 
in  the  preceding  chapter,  to  the  political  events  that 
followed  the  revolutionary  movements  of  1848.  Vienna 
became  the  seat  of  government  of  a  newly  organized 
empire,  and  acquired  a  most  liberal  municipal  consti- 
tution. Its  prestige  grew  enormously,  and  it  absorbed 
wealth  and  population  from  all  parts  of  the  Austrian 
dominions.  The  imperial  government  and  the  mu- 
nicipal authorities  vied  with  one  another  in  projects 
for  the  embellishment  of  the  capital,  the  chief  of  these 
projects  being  the  Ring-strasse  and  its  incomparable 
array  of  public  buildings.  Meanwhile  Hungary  was 
chafing  under  the  disappointment  and  humiliation  of 
defeat,  and  was  making  little,  if  any,  progress.  But 
the  Austro-Prussian  war  of  1866  humiliated  in  turn 
the  so-called  oppressor  of  Hungary.  The  Hungarians 
opportunity,  were  now  in  a  position  to  demand  all  that  Kossuth 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


437 


The  dual 
monarchy. 


and  his  compatriots  had  struggled  so  desperately  in  CHAP.  ix. 
1848  to  gain.  To  the  counsel  of  the  Hungarian  pa- 
triot and  sage  Francis  Deak,  one  of  the  great  men  of 
modern  times,  is  due  the  fact  that,  instead  of  absolute 
separation  from  Austria,  Hungary  accepted  the  form 
of  dual  monarchy  that  has  existed  since  1868.  Hun- 
gary became  a  constitutional  monarchy  of  the  most 
liberal  sort,  having  its  own  parliament,  its  own  cabi- 
net, its  own  entire  administration,  with  Budapest  as 
capital.  The  Emperor  of  Austria  became  King  of 
Hungary.  The  two  parts  of  the  confederation  were 
absolutely  coordinate.  Their  military  and  diplomatic 
services  were  of  necessity  united  like  those  of  a  single 
empire ;  but  the  delegations  from  the  two  parliaments 
which  meet  annually  to  vote  the  joint  budget,  and  to 
order  the  joint  services,  sit  in  alternate  years  at 
Vienna  and  Budapest.  It  is  true  that  the  Emperor's 
ordinary  residence  is  in  Vienna,  and  that  Vienna  is 
the  seat  of  administration  of  the  confederate  empire ; 
but  the  Emperor  is  careful  to  spend  much  of  his  time, 
with  his  family  and  his  court,  in  Hungary.  In  short, 
politically,  the  two  capitals  are  as  nearly  on  a  par  as 
it  is  possible  to  make  them. 

This  change  in  the  political  wind  had  a  most  sur- 
prising effect  upon  Budapest.  Hungary  was  at  last 
free  and  self-governing,  and  in  possession  of  liberal  Newlifefor 
institutions.  The  hopes  of  1848  were  now  to  find  Budapest. 
realization.  The  whole  life  of  the  nation  was  invig- 
orated, and  that  life  centered  in  the  capital.  Ambi- 
tious young  politicians  had  no  longer  to  seek  a  career 
in  Vienna.  Home  rule  gave  them  full  scope  in  Buda- 
pest. Social  life  was  also  awakened.  The  Hungarian 
nobles,  who,  with  every  other  element  in  the  popula- 
tion of  the  empire,  had  been  contributing  to  the 
architectural  splendor  and  social  brilliancy  of  Vienna, 
were  now  disposed  to  build  their  palaces  in  their  own 

28* 


438 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 


capital. 


The  decen- 
tralizing 
tendency 

in  Austria. 


CHAP.  ix.  capital ;  for  they  had  acquired  seats  in  the  upper  house 
A  home-rule  of  the  Hungarian  parliament,  while  Vienna  was  hence- 
forth to  be  regarded  as  their  capital  hardly  more  than 
Berlin  or  Paris.  The  transformation  and  embellish- 
ment of  Vienna  as  the  sole  capital  of  Francis  Joseph's 
dominions  had  just  begun  fairly  to  show  results,  when 
the  new  order  of  things  cut  those  dominions  in  two 
parts,  and  made  Budapest  the  rival  capital,  with 
slightly  the  larger  of  the  two  territorial  divisions.  It 
is  true  that  Hungary  had  a  smaller  population,  and 
industrially  was  far  less  advanced  than  the  prov- 
inces of  which  Vienna  remained  the  capital ;  but  the 
curtailment  was  obviously  detrimental  to  Vienna  in 
many  ways.  Moreover,  Vienna  has  felt  the  effects  of 
decentralizing  tendencies  in  the  provinces  remaining 
to  her ;  for  the  Bohemians  are  developing  their  beau- 
tiful local  capital  Prague,  the  Austrian  Poles  are 
expending  their  energies  upon  their  own  Cracow,  the 
Moravians  are  improving  Brunn,  the  Italians  are 
showing  preference  for  Trieste,  and  other  provincial 
centers  are  beginning  to  assert  themselves.  In  Hun- 
gary, on  the  other  hand,  Budapest  has  no  rivals ;  all 
roads  lead  to  the  capital.  There  is  in  Hungary  a 
compactness  and  unity  that  form  a  marked  contrast 
with  the  scattered  and  discordant  provinces  which 
have  their  political  center  in  Vienna.  Budapes1  is 
now  the  capital  of  a  nation  of  seventeen  millions  of 
progressive  and  ambitious  people,  and  this  new  politi- 
cal fact  is  of  itself  sufficient  to  account  for  much 
of  its  growth. 

The  commercial  conditions  also  are  not  to  be  over- 
looked. Hungary  is  an  agricultural  country,  lying 
for  the  most  part  in  the  rich  valley  of  the  Danube 
and  its  principal  tributaries.  Central  Hungary  is 
a  vast  level  plain,  an  uninterrupted  stretch  of  culti- 
vated fields.  One  rides  across  it  late  in  June  or  early 


Unity  of 
Hungary. 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METKOPOLIS 


439 


in  July  to  find  it  looking  much  like  Illinois  or  Iowa, 
the  chief  crops  being  wheat,  maize,  oats,  barley,  and 
hay,  growing  luxuriantly  and  extending  as  far  as 
the  eye  can  reach,  without  fences  to  break  the  sweep 
of  vision.  In  these  favored  recent  times  the  agricul- 
tural production  has  much  increased,  and  Budapest  is 
the  market  for  the  farm  surplusage.  As  a  grain- 
receiving  point  it  is  to  the  Hungarian  plain  what 
Chicago  is  to  Illinois  and  Iowa,  or  what  Minneapolis  is 
to  Minnesota  and  Dakota.  It  is  hard  to  realize  how 
commercially  undeveloped  all  this  Hungarian  coun- 
try was  only  a  few  years  ago,  and  what  meager 
facilities  it  had  for  reaching  the  markets  of  Europe 
with  its  surplus  food  products.  The  new  govern- 
ment at  Budapest  set  itself  to  work  to  develop  agri- 
culture and  trade,  without  any  particular  fear  of 
being  charged  with  socialistic  activities.  Somebody 
had  to  take  the  initiative.  The  country  was  poor  and 
without  capital.  To  secure  a  system  of  railroads 
it  was  necessary  to  grant  heavy  subsidies  to  Eng- 
lish, French,  and  German  capitalists,  who  formed  com- 
panies and  established  lines.  But  the  government 
found  subsequently  that  it  could  better  afford  to  take 
over  the  roads,  and  put  them  under  a  consolidated 
public  administration,  than  to  pay  annual  subsidies  to 
a  dozen  private  companies.  The  results  have  justified 
its  policy.  In  every  possible  way  the  government 
has  made  the  State  railway  system  conduce  to  the 
development  of  Hungarian  industries.  Under  the 
railway  administration  there  has  been  established  at 
Budapest  a  great  government  manufactory,  not  only 
of  locomotives  but  of  all  sorts  of  heavy  machinery, 
including  agricultural  machines,  a  special  product 
being  threshing-machines.  It  is  only  recently  that 
machinery  has  been  introduced  in  the  farming  opera- 
tions of  southeastern  Europe,  and  the  innovation 


CHAP.  IX. 

Budapest  as 
a  grain 
market. 


The  State 
railroad 
system. 


The  govern- 
ment as  a 
maker  of 
farm 

machinery. 


440  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  makes  headway  somewhat  slowly  against  the  preju- 
dices of  the  peasantry.  Thus,  in  a  recent  summer, 
in  the  hay-fields  of  the  Hungarian  plain,  I  saw  many 
a  row  of  mowers,  wearing  the  long  white  cotton  tunics 
of  the  region,  and  swinging  their  scythes  in  unison, 
quite  as  described  by  Tolstoi  in  the  famous  mow- 
ing chapter  of  "Anna  Karenina."  Indeed,  I  did  not 
happen  to  see  a  single  mowing-machine  at  work.  But 
I  am  assured  that  mowing-  and  reaping-machines 
are  largely  used  in  some  parts  of  the  country,  and 
that  their  use  is  steadily  increasing. 

As  all  the  railroads  center  in  Budapest,  every  effort 
to  develop  Hungarian  agriculture  benefits  the  com- 
mercial capital.  The  grain  shipments,  however,  are 
Danube  chiefly  by  water, —  on  the  Danube  and  its  tributa- 
commerce.  rjes^ — a  great  fleet  of  roofed  grain-barges  plying 
on  these  waterways  between  Budapest  and  the  wheat- 
fields.  Some  of  these  barges,  which  are  of  a  con- 
struction peculiar  to  the  Danube,  have  a  capacity 
of  six  hundred  tons  of  grain.  The  government  has 
exerted  itself  to  improve  navigation,  and  great  river 
improvements  have  been  made  at  Budapest,  to  which 
I  shall  again  refer.  While  the  growth  of  Budapest 
has  been  influenced  by  causes  already  described,  it 
BudLplst/s  cas  also  l>een  aided  by  the  development  of  the  flour- 
industry  milling  industry.  Within  twenty-five  years  the  pro- 
cesses of  flour-making  throughout  the  world  have 
been  revolutionized  by  reason  of  certain  Budapest  in- 
ventions, of  which  the  most  important  is  the  so-called 
"middlings-purifier"  and  gradual-reduction  system, 
and  the  next  in  importance  the  substitution  of  steel 
rollers  of  various  sizes  and  patterns  for  the  old-time 
millstones.  These  inventions  have  resulted  in  giving 
the  industry  of  flour-making  to  large  mills,  thus  anni- 
hilating small  mills  by  tens  of  thousands.  The  new 
ideas  were  quickly  borrowed  by  Minnesota  millers, 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS  441 

and  by  them  were  largely  developed  and  improved  j  CHAP.  ix. 
and  Minneapolis  and  Budapest  have  grown  contempo- 
raneously as  the  two  great  milling  centers  of  the 
world.  Minneapolis  leads  in  the  collective  capacity 
of  its  mills  and  in  the  annual  product;  but  it  has 
a  larger  field  in  which  to  operate,  and  possesses  facili- 
ties which  Budapest  lacks.  The  mills  of  the  Hunga- 
rian capital  are,  however,  a  series  of  magnificent 
establishments,  fitted  up  with  automatic  machinery 
invented  and  manufactured  in  the  city,  provided  with 
electric  lights,  and  well  supplied  with  ingenious 
contrivances  to  prevent  fire.  Their  finest  grades  of 
flour  are  sent  to  all  parts  of  the  world  except  the 
United  States,  and  command  the  highest  prices.  One  A  municipal 
of  the  municipal  institutions  of  Budapest  is  a  huge  elector. 
brick  grain-elevator, — the  only  one  in  all  Hungary  at 
the  time  it  was  built, —  occupying  a  conspicuous  place 
near  the  Danube  bank  and  convenient  also  to  railway 
tracks.  It  was  built  by  the  city  some  years  ago  as  an 
object-lesson  in  the  modern  American  methods  of 
handling  grain. 

Although  it  is  to  see  new  things  rather  than  old 
that  one  visits  Budapest,  it  may  be  well  to  say  that 
the  town  once  possessed  a  Roman  fortress  and  colony,  The  old  time 
and  that  its  commanding  site  has  involved  it  in  mili-  fortress. 
tary  operations  from  time  immemorial.  It  is  only  two 
hundred  years  since  the  Turks  were  driven  out  of 
Hungary,  after  an  occupation  of  a  century  and  a  half. 
The  fortress  and  rugged  promontory  are  upon  the 
right,  or  south,  bank  of  the  Danube,  and  pertain 
to  Buda.  Pest  lies  upon  the  flat  north  bank,  and 
beyond  it  stretches  the  illimitable  plain.  In  the  old 
times  Buda  was  the  large  town,  while  Pest  was  only 
an  insignificant  village ;  but  all  the  modern  conditions 
of  growth  have  favored  the  Pest  side,  which  is  now 
four  times  as  populous  as  the  other.  The  Buda  or 


442  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  Of  en  (Ofen  is  the  German  name  for  Buda)  bank 
is,  however,  picturesque  in  the  highest  degree.  The 
Blocksberg  promontory  rises  abruptly,  a  sheer  mass 
of  rugged  rock,  nearly  a  thousand  feet  above  the 

The  citadel    grand  stream  that  washes  its  base  ;  and  it  is  crowned 

and  the  new         .  ,  -  .,_.,  .  , 

Pantheon,  with  a  now  useless  citadel.  For  a  long  time,  the 
Hungarians  had  promised  themselves  that  some  day 
a  classic  pantheon  in  honor  of  Hungary's  long  list  of 
great  men  should  be  erected  on  this  commanding 
acropolis.  And  now  one  of  the  chief  events  of  the 
millennial  programme  of  1896  is  to  be  the  dedication 
of  this  Pantheon,  in  which  will  be  placed  the  statues 
of  personages  whose  name  and  fame  give  luster  to  a 
thousand  years  of  Hungarian  history.  Adjoining  the 
Blocksberg,  but  not  so  high,  and  rising  less  steeply 
from  the  river's  brink,  is  the  fortress  hill,  upon  which 
stands  a  vast  royal  palace.  Its  cheerful  buff-colored 
paint  and  long  rows  of  green  window-blinds  suggest 
a  summer  resort  hotel ;  but  it  is  really  a  very  impos- 
ing structure,  and  its  situation  could  hardly  be  more 
commanding.  About  it,  on  hillsides  and  in  valleys, 
Buda  and  its  lies  the  town  once  called  Buda.  On  the  retreating 
hillsides.  s}Opes  of  the  Blocksberg,  and  upon  the  sides  of  the 
higher  mountains  that  lie  in  the  rear,  are  many 
pleasant  villas.  Buda  and  its  neighboring  hills  have 
long  been  famous  for  their  vineyards  and  their  wines. 
From  the  Blocksberg  or  any  other  of  the  neighboring 
heights,  the  view  up  and  down  the  Danube,  and  over 
the  stately  city  of  Pest  on  the  opposite  bank,  is 
enchanting. 

It  would,  of  course,  be  erroneous  to  say  that  all 
the  progress,  all  the  improvements,  and  all  the  good 
The  period    buildings  of  Budapest  date  from  the  new  Hungarian 
of  progress.    constitution  of  1868,  or  from  the  municipal  consolida- 
tion of  Buda  and  Pest  which  followed  that  political 
event,  and  which  was  consummated  in  1873.  Between 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METKOPOLIS 


443 


CHAP.  ix. 


Budapest 


1848  and  1868  not  a  little  progress  had  been  made. 
The  Archduke  Joseph  had  done  much  for  the  sister 
towns.  Population  had  increased  materially  ;  the 
magnificent  suspension-bridge  had  been  built;  the 
patriotic  Count  Stephan  Szechenyi  had  founded  the 
National  Academy  to  foster  the  Magyar  speech  and 
literature,  and  had  built  for  it  a  fitting  renaissance 
palace  at  this  time,  when  the  Germans  were  "  in  the 
saddle,"  and  when  even  the  University  of  Budapest 
was  a  German  institution  with  German  professors 
in  its  chairs.  Although,  with  Russian  aid,  the  Aus- 
trians  had  crushed  the  Hungarian  movement  of  1848, 
so  that  the  people's  leaders  had  to  choose  between 
exile  and  the  halter,  while  for  some  years  the  whole 
Hungarian  nation  was  made  to  feel  the  heavy  weight 
of  the  Austrian  yoke,  it  is  nevertheless  true  that 
the  awakening  of  that  year  of  revolutions  resulted 
in  a  progress  which  left  many  marks  in  two  dec- 
ades. But  after  this  is  said  the  fact  remains  that 
nearly  all  the  systematic,  appreciable  advances  of 
Hungary  have  been  made  in  the  years  that  have  fol- 
lowed the  happier  events  of  1868.  In  Budapest,  de- 
liberate projects  were  adopted  for  the  beautifying  and  National 
development  of  the  city  as  a  fit  capital  for  an  ambi-  tion  hfises. 
tious  young  state.  The  exiles  of  1848  came  back 
with  wisdom  and  experience  to  take  the  helm.  Count 
Andrassy,  who  had  been  sentenced  to  be  hung,  now 
became  prime  minister.  The  reaction  was  most  ener- 
getic. For  the  time  being,  all  things  German  were 
at  a  heavy  discount.  The  German  officials  were  hus- 
tled out  to  a  man.  The  University  was  reorganized 
on  a  Hungarian  basis,  and  the  whole  corps  of  German 
professors  was  unceremoniously  dismissed. 

Such  being  the  national  mood,  it  is  easy  to  under- 
stand that  the  moment  was  propitious  for  large  plans. 
Vienna  was  carrying  out  its  stadt-erweiterung  projects 


444 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IX. 

City 

improve- 
ment plans. 


Essential 

nature  of 

the  Danube. 


The  quays 

and 
promenades. 


Public 
buildings  on 
river-front. 


in  the  most  magnificent  way;  and  while  Budapest 
could  hardly  hope  to  become  a  Vienna,  there  was  a 
unanimous  determination  to  modernize  and  improve 
the  place  to  the  highest  possible  degree.  The  minis- 
try and  the  municipal  authorities  cooperated,  and 
building  operations  were  intrusted  to  a  mixed  com- 
mission of  the  national  and  city  governments.  As 
was  proper  alike  from  esthetic,  sanitary,  and  com- 
mercial considerations,  the  river  was  made  the  cen- 
ter of  improvements,  and  was  constituted  the  prime 
thoroughfare,  the  chief  open  space  and  place  of  re- 
sort, and,  in  short,  the  unrivaled  attraction  of  the 
city.  It  became  to  Budapest  what  the  Grand  Canal 
is  to  Venice  —  something  more  essential  than  the 
Seine  to  Paris  or  the  Thames  to  London.  Magnifi- 
cent stone  quays  and  retaining- walls  were  built,  ex- 
tending for  nearly  three  miles  on  the  Pest  side  and  also 
for  a  long  distance  on  the  opposite  shore.  These  were 
thrown  well  out,  the  broad  channel  being  thus  com- 
pressed somewhat  to  secure  a  clean,  sweeping  current. 
Up  and  down  along  the  broad  promenades  facing 
the  water  have  been  erected  palatial  buildings.  The 
quays  are  high,  and  stairs,  built  continuously  for  a 
long  distance,  lead  down  to  the  lower  level  of  the 
landings,  upon  which  the  heavy  traffic  is  confined. 
The  rows  of  buildings  are  broken  at  intervals  by 
open  park  spaces,  in  which  are  effectively  placed  the 
statues  of  various  Hungarian  notabilities.  A  number 
of  handsome  public  buildings  are  included  in  the 
row  upon  the  quays  of  the  left  bank,  and  toward  the 
upper  end  of  the  row  has  been  built  the  magnificent 
new  Parliament  house,  in  which  the  first  session  will 
occur  in  1896.  Further  down  are  the  National  Acad- 
emy, the  city's  so-called  "  Redoute  building,"  the  old 
Rathhaus  (city  hall),  the  vast  new  Custom-house, 
and  various  other  establishments.  For  the  distance 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


445 


of  perhaps  a  quarter  of  a  mile  below  the  suspension- 
bridge  the  quay  is  a  shady  promenade,  a  chair-lined 
corso,  upon  which  all  driving  is  prohibited,  and  where 
on  summer  evenings  many  hundreds  of  fashionable 
people  congregate,  patronizing  the  cafes  and  restau- 
rants, the  tables  of  which  are  set  under  the  trees  in 
the  open  air.  The  Hungarians  are  even  more  fond 
of  out-of-door  eating  and  drinking  than  the  Viennese; 
and  Budapest  is  a  city  of  magnificent  cafe's. 

But,  to  proceed  with  a  description  of  the  improve- 
ment plan,  the  inner  and  ancient  Pest,  known  as  "  the 
city,"  and  lying  upon  the  river-bank,  has  been  sur- 
rounded by  boulevards  in  the  form  of  a  polygonal 
"  ring-strasse  ";  while  by  demolitions  and  reconstruc- 
tions the  interior  tangle  of  narrow  streets  has  been 
brought  into  something  like  a  modern  system.  From 
the  sides  and  angles  of  the  inner  ring-strasse  broad 
radial  boulevards  have  been  thrown  out  in  straight, 
or  measurably  straight,  lines  to  the  outer  edges  of 
the  metropolis,  and  the  lands  lying  between  these 
great  spokes  are  divided  by  street  systems  almost  as 
regular  and  rectangular  as  those  of  American  cities. 
Handsome  as  is  the  broad  inner  ring  of  boulevards, 
lined  with  fine  buildings,  it  is  far  surpassed  by  the 
newer  "  grosse-ring,"  which  crosses  the  radials  about 
a  mile  further  out,  and  which  describes  an  arc  that, 
from  the  new  Margaret  Bridge  to  the  point  where  it 
again  meets  the  river,  is  four  or  five  miles  long.  It 
is  very  broad  and  finely  paved,  and  is  already  lined 
for  the  greater  part  of  its  course  with  massive,  pre- 
tentious structures,  while  building  operations  are 
now  busily  closing  the  gaps  all  along  the  line.  Still 
other  ring  boulevards  in  a  concentric  series  are  to  be 
constructed  in  the  future. 

The  finest  single  street  in  Budapest,  the  gem  of  the 
improvement  works  and  the  pride  of  the  citizens,  is 


CHAP.  ix. 


Street 
reforms. 


rhe  two 


446 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IX. 

The  An- 
drdssy 
street. 


Character 
of  paving. 


the  Andrassy-strasse,  a  broad  boulevard  connecting 
the  inner  city  with  the  "  Stadtwaldchen."  The  An- 
drassy-strasse is  perfectly  straight,  and  two  miles 
long.  It  was  planned  with  consummate  art,  and  is 
one  of  the  most  beautiful  and  effective  streets  in 
Europe.  Some  enthusiastic  people  pronounce  it  with- 
out exception  the  handsomest  of  European  streets, 
and  certainly  it  tempts  one  to  use  superlative  lan- 
guage. It  is  divided  into  three  parts  by  the  "  Octa- 
gon-platz,"  where  it  crosses  the  larger  ring-strasse, 
and  by  the  "  Rund-platz,"  or  "  circus,"  at  a  point 
where  another  encircling  boulevard  is  eventually  to 
cross.  As  it  emerges  from  the  Octagon-platz  and 
the  Bund-platz  the  street  grows  successively  wider, 
although  this  would  hardly  be  noticed  by  the  casual 
passer.  The  first  third  of  the  distance  is  devoted 
to  fine  buildings,  of  varied  architecture  but  general 
conformity,  built  solidly  on  the  street  line.  The 
next  third  contains  houses  having  narrow  fore-gar- 
dens of  a  prescribed  width.  The  last  third  —  extend- 
ing for  two  thirds  of  a  mile  —  is  devoted  to  separate 
villa-like  residences,  all  at  similar  distance  from  the 
sidewalks,  and,  with  infinite  variety  of  architectu- 
ral detail,  conforming  to  the  regular  street  plan.  The 
vista  from  the  entrance  of  this  street  to  its  end  in  the 
shady  Stadtwaldchen  is  very  beautiful.  The  broad 
central  driveway  is  paved  with  wooden  blocks  on  a 
solid  concrete  foundation.  The  sidewalks  are  of  as- 
phalt, the  narrower  driveways  next  the  sidewalks  are 
paved  with  square-cut  stone  blocks,  and  the  eques- 
trian courses,  which  are  between  the  central  and  the 
outer  driveways,  are  graveled.  Although  there  are 
no  individual  buildings  on  the  Andrassy-strasse  which 
cannot  readily  be  matched  in  any  other  important 
city,  the  average  of  architectural  merit  is  very  high  ; 
and  the  absence  of  anything  that  can  mar  the  general 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


447 


The  prin- 
cipal park. 


effect  is  an  important  element  in  the  success  of  this    CHAP.  ix. 
public  improvement.   It  should  be  said  that  the  Buda 
side  has  also  its  boulevard  system,  and  that  the  cost 
of  expropriations  and  of  construction  in  this  remod- 
eling of  the  street-system  has  aggregated  a  large  sum. 

The  Stadtwaldchen  is  a  beautiful  park  of  about  a 
thousand  acres  which  plays  a  most  intimate  part  in 
the  life  of  the  Budapest  people.  Fortunately  it  is  not 
remote  or  difficult  of  access,  and  is  to  Budapest  what 
the  "  Prater  "  is  to  Vienna.  It  contains  a  charming 
lake  for  skating  in  winter  and  for  pleasure-boats  in 
summer.  It  has  its  areas  of  deep  and  quiet  shade,  its 
zoological  corner,  and,  above  all,  its  collection  of  cafes, 
refreshment-stands,  shooting-galleries,  "  roller-coast- 
ers," arenas,  Punch  and  Judy  shows,  summer  theaters, 
wax- work  exhibitions,  and  "  side-shows  "  in  bewilder- 
ing variety,  all  very  cheap,  all  very  good  of  their 
respective  sorts,  and  all  very  delightful  to  the  plea- 
sure-loving thousands  who  resort  to  the  park  in  the 
spring  and  summer  afternoons.  Here  is  located  also 
one  of  the  municipal  government's  hot  sulphur- water 
bathing  establishments.  Of  small  parks  and  open 
spaces  the  city  has  a  number,  though  not  so  many  as 
should  have  been  reserved.  The  Elisabeth  Park  is 
especially  worthy  of  mention. 

Certainly  it  would  be  unpardonable  to  omit  mention 
of  the  "  Margareta  Island."  The  "  Margareten-Insel "  The  Marga- 
lies  in  the  Danube,  at  the  upper  end  of  the  city.  In  an-  reta  Island" 
cient  days  it  belonged  to  an  order  of  nuns,  the  ruins  of 
whose  convent  still  remain.  In  the  fifteenth  century 
the  Turks  drove  the  poor  nuns  away,  and  the  janizary 
pashas  established  their  harems  there.  On  the  expul- 
sion of  the  Turks  the  island  became  city  property,  but 
a  generation  ago  it  was  given  by  the  municipality  to 
the  Archduke  Joseph  for  a  hunting-ground.  The 
present  archduke  keeps  it  in  beautiful  order  as  a 


448 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IX. 


Parks  on 
the  Buda 
hillsides. 


Budapest's 
council 
of  400. 


The  tax- 
payers' 
element. 


Too  large 
a  body. 


pleasure-ground  for  the  public.  It  is  nearly  two 
miles  long  and  about  half  a  mile  wide,  and  it  deserves 
the  enthusiasm  with  which  the  Budapest  people  re- 
gard it.  It  is  full  of  a  variety  of  magnificent  trees, 
has  tasteful  flower-gardens,  is  also  the  seat  of  min- 
eral baths  elaborately  appointed,  with  two  or  three 
adjoining  hotels,  and  has  the  restaurants  without 
which  no  pleasure-ground  would  be  complete  in  south- 
ern Europe.  Among  the  hills  of  the  Buda  side,  also, 
are  parks  and  pleasure-grounds;  and  the  population 
is  blessed  with  much  beautiful  weather  and  a  great 
number  of  holidays  in  which  to  enjoy  its  open-air 
advantages. 

Budapest  has  a  municipal  council  that  is  as  large  as 
a  "  town-meeting."  If  any  other  city  in  the  world  has 
a  council  of  400  members,  I  have  not  yet  learned  the 
fact.  Pest  began  in  1868  with  200  members;  but 
when  the  consolidation  was  effected  in  1873  the  plan 
of  adding  200  members  chosen  from  the  higher  ranks 
was  adopted.  It  was  provided  that  the  whole  body 
of  electors,  besides  choosing  200  common  members 
in  the  nine  wards,  should  choose  200  more  from  a  list 
of  the  1200  largest  taxpayers.  In  the  making  of  this 
list  men  of  liberal  education  are  rated  for  double 
the  taxes  they  actually  pay,  in  order  that  brains  and 
learning  may  have  recognition.  A  standing  com- 
mittee makes  out  a  list  of  the  aristocratic  200,  and 
it  so  happens  that  the  great  voting  public  always 
elects  the  entire  list  thus  selected.  The  whole  coun- 
cil retires  en  masse  at  the  end  of  each  six  years'  term. 
The  body  is  of  course  much  too  large  for  efficiency. 
Possibly  a  hundred  will  be  found  at  one  ordinary 
meeting,  and  at  the  next  meeting  a  hundred  again, 
but  quite  a  different  hundred.  The  committees  also 
are  much  too  large  to  be  workable,  some  of  them 
having  thirty  or  forty  members.  The  actual  execu- 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS 


449 


tive  work  is  performed  by  a  magistracy  composed  of 
a  burgomaster,  two  vice-burgomasters,  and  ten  other 
so-called  magistrates,  all  chosen  by  the  council  for 
terms  of  six  years.  Each  magistrate  has  his  special 
administrative  department.  These  and  several  other 
high  executive  officials  are  ex-officio  members  of  the 
council.  Two  officials,  the  Director  of  Archives  and 
the  Director  of  the  Municipal  Bureau  of  Statistics,  are 
appointed  for  lif e.  The  advisability  of  reducing  the 
membership  of  the  council  is  generally  recognized, 
and  when  the  opportune  moment  for  a  revision  of  the 
municipal  constitution  comes,  it  is  quite  possible  that 
the  aristocratic  200  will  be  cut  off  at  the  first  stroke. 
But  the  inefficiency  of  the  present  unwieldy  council  is 
counterbalanced  by  the  efficiency  of  the  smaller  mag- 
isterial and  executive  corps,  so  that  Budapest  cannot 
by  any  means  be  called  a  badly  governed  city. 

Apart  from  Budapest,  the  municipalities  of  Hun- 
gary are  organized  under  the  terms  of  a  general  stat- 
ute which  makes  a  difference  between  the  smaller 
places — the  communes  (gemeinden) — and  the  munici- 
pal corporations.  The  smaller  places  are  self-gov- 
erned upon  principles  similar  to  those  that  obtain  in 
the  organization  of  the  municipalities,  but  their  sys- 
tem is  less  elaborate.  The  basis  of  things  in  all  cases 
is  a  municipal  council,  which  in  the  little  rural  ham- 
lets and  villages  varies  in  size  from  10  to  20  members, 
in  the  larger  communes  from  20  to  40,  and  in  the  fully 
developed  municipalities  from  48  to  200.  Hungary 
lias  no  large  cities  except  Budapest,  but  it  has  about 
twenty  large  towns  which  by  the  census  of  1890  had 
an  average  population  approaching  fifty  thousand. 
The  voters  are  those  who  have  paid  a  small  tax.  The 
general  rule  prevails  throughout  Hungary  that  one 
half  of  the  communal  or  municipal  council  shall  be 
elected  by  the  whole  body  of  voters,  and  that  the 

29 


CHAP.  IX. 

The  execu- 
tive 
magistracy. 


Efficiency 
of  adminis- 
trative 
corps. 


The  Hun- 
garian 
system  in 
general. 


Size 
of  councils. 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


CHAP.  IX 

Largest  tax- 
payers 
occupy  half 
of  the  coun- 
cil seats. 


Recognition 

of  educated 

men. 


Some 
peculiar 
provisions. 


other  half  shall  be  made  up  of  the  largest  local  tax- 
payers who  are  eligible  by  virtue  of  citizenship,  resi- 
dence, age,  etc.  It  is  this  arrangement,  doubtless, 
that  has  influenced  the  Hungarian  parliament  in 
ordaining  that  the  councils  shall  be  so  large.  Thus 
in  a  town  whose  council  consists  of  200  members,  the 
first  hundred  is  made  up  of  men  who  have  a  right  to 
their  seats  by  virtue  of  the  fact  that  they  head  the 
tax-list.  They  hold  their  seats  for  no  definite  period, 
because  the  tax-lists  are  revised  every  year,  and  cir- 
cumstances make  changes  in  the  personnel  of  the  hun- 
dred who  are  nearest  the  top.  While  these  tax-payers 
have  a  right  to  sit  in  the  council,  it  does  not  follow 
that  they  will  care  regularly  to  exercise  the  right. 
The  more  stable  element  of  the  body  consists,  there- 
fore, of  the  half  regularly  elected  by  the  voters.  As 
in  Budapest,  so  in  all  the  towns  and  communes  of 
Hungary  it  is  true  that  professional  men  and  all  men 
who  follow  callings  that  imply  considerable  education 
are  listed  at  double  the  amount  of  taxes  they  actually 
pay,  in  order  that  their  classes  may  be  reasonably  sure 
of  a  good  share  in  the  make-up  of  the  governing  bod- 
ies. It  is  only  in  Budapest  that  the  aristocratic  half 
of  the  council  is  chosen  by  election  from  a  larger  list. 
Elsewhere  it  suffices  that  a  man  is  a  member  of  the 
group  of  largest  tax-payers.  Under  certain  specified 
circumstances  a  large  tax -payer  who  is  non-resident  or 
otherwise  unable  to  serve  may  name  his  own  substi- 
tute. Sometimes  a  large  tax-payer  prefers  to  hold  his 
council  seat  as  one  of  the  elected  members  of  the 
body ;  in  which  case  the  next  largest  tax-payer  comes 
forward  as  a  councilor.  It  is  an  interesting  fact, 
moreover,  that  any  firm,  company,  or  other  organiza- 
tion that  pays  taxes  on  property  may,  as  a  legal  per- 
sonage, exercise  the  local  franchise  through  some  one 
holding  its  power  of  attorney  or  authorization.  In 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS  451 

Budapest,  where  the  whole  electorate  (composed  of    CHAP.  ix. 
all  tax-paying  citizens  who  can  read  and  write)  has  a 
right  to  vote  for  200  out  of  the  list  of  1200  largest  tax-   wider  range 
payers,  the  room<  for  selection  is  so  wide  that  the  infBudape°st. 
results  are  very  different  from  those  that  are  found  in 
other  towns,  where  absolutely  the  largest  tax-payers 
always  fill   half   the  places  in  the  council  without 
election.     The  standing  executive  committees  and  the 
chief  officials  carry  on  the  practical  work  of  adminis- 
tration in  a  manner  that  is  much  alike  throughout  the 
entire  Austro-Hungarian  empire.     The  chief  heads  of    Executive 
departments,  who  form  with  the  burgomaster  a  mag-      system- 
isterial  council,  and  who,  like  the  German  magistrates, 
are  practically  life  members  of  the  municipal  service, 
have  seats  in  the  general  town  councils,  with  the  right 
to  speak  and  vote. 

The  social  aspects  of  municipal  administration 
have  a  growing  interest  and  importance,  and  Buda- 
pest's experience  and  undertakings  are  worth  relating,  successful 
Before  1870  the  average  annual  death-rate  was  45  per  administra- 
1000  inhabitants,  and  in  epidemic  years  it  reached  50. 
The  rate  is  now  about  25 ;  and  this  remarkable  reduc- 
tion has  been  effected  in  the  face  of  the  rapid  growth 
of  the  city's  population.  It  means  the  saving  of 
at  least  ten  thousand  lives  a  year.  The  rate  is  no 
longer  a  very  high  one  even  when  compared  with 
western  Europe  or  America ;  and  it  is  to  be  remem- 
bered that  Budapest  is  the  capital  of  a  country  that 
borders  on  the  Turkish  empire.  The  death-rate  in  most 
Eastern  countries  is  vastly  higher  than  in  Western 
countries.  Thus  in  Russia,  and  in  the  Danubian  and 
Balkan  states,  the  rate  is  higher  than  in  Hungary. 
That  Budapest,  the  crowded  city,  has  managed  to 
bring  its  death-rate  to  a  point  below  that  of  the 
country  as  a  whole  is  a  most  exceptional  and  note-  death-rate  is 
worthy  fact.  From  45  per  1000  a  very  few  years  Hungary's. 


452  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

CHAP.  ix.  earlier,  the  Budapest  rate  had  fallen  to  41  in  1876,  40 
in  1877,  31.2  in  1884,  29.4  in  1885,  27.9  in  1892,  26.8 
in  1893,  and  24.4  in  1895.  How  has  this  gratify- 
ing improvement  of  the  general  health  been  effected  ? 
By  a  series  of  municipal  measures  not  yet  fully  com- 
pleted. The  first  of  these  measures  was  an  improved 

The  question  water-supply.  The  Danube  water  was  pumped  into 
reservoirs  and  filtered  by  the  natural  process  through 
sand,  with  good  results.  The  town  grew  so  fast  that 
the  water  question  again  became  a  pressing  one,  some 
quarters  being  obliged  to  accept  an  unfiltered  supply, 
and  it  was  determined  to  provide  a  new  and  permanent 
system,  various  plans  being  proposed,  and  artesian 
wells  being  tried  with  good  results. 

As  the  sequel  has  proved,  one  of  the  most  fortunate 

The  bureau    features  of  the  municipal  reorganization  that  followed 

of  statistics.  Hungary's  assumption  of  home  rule  was  the  establish- 
ment of  a  bureau  of  statistics.  Mr.  Joseph  Korosi  was 
made  statistician  for  life ;  and  he  completed  twenty- 
five  years  of  service  in  1894.  His  reports,  monographs, 
brochures,  and  special  investigations,  pertaining  to 
almost  every  conceivable  municipal  question  capable 

Mr  Korosi-s  °^  statistical  treatment,  are  without  a  parallel  in  the 
work.  -world  for  their  complete,  exhaustive,  and  timely 
character;  and  the  social  and  sanitary  reforms  of 
Budapest  have  followed  the  lines  laid  down  by  the 
statistical  bureau.  Until  Mr.  KOrOsi's  work  began, 
the  high  mortality  of  Budapest  was  not  known.  Its 
citizens  thought  it  an  extremely  healthy  place.  The 
statistical  office  was  denounced  as  slandering  and 
injuring  the  city  when  it  first  discovered  and  pub- 

The  findings  Hshed  the  facts.  But  Mr.  KOrflsi  persevered,  and  his 
remarkable  census  of  1871  attempted  to  account  for 
the  high  mortality.  He  made  a  thorough  study  of  the 
conditions  of  the  population,  and  found  overcrowding 
very  prevalent,  and,  worst  of  all,  a  very  large  element 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


453 


of  the  population  in  damp  underground  residences. 
There  followed  a  series  of  regulations  to  prevent  these 
evils.  Living  in  cellars  was  forbidden,  and  new  quar- 
ters for  the  poor  were  constructed.  But  the  badly 
housed  population  was  too  large  to  be  shifted  at  once, 
and  it  became  necessary  to  permit  the  reoccupancy  of 
the  drier  and  less  objectionable  subground  domiciles. 
In  1881  the  cellar  abodes  had  been  reduced  to  7.6  per 
cent,  of  the  whole  number,  while  in  1891  the  propor- 
tion had  fallen  to  5  per  cent.  In  Vienna,  meanwhile 
the  cellar  dwellings  in  1891  were  only  1.2  per  cent,  of 
the  whole  number,  by  virtue  of  the  reconstruction  of 
the  people's  dwellings  that  I  have  already  described. 

The  very  striking  fact  about  the  homes  of  the 
common  people  in  Budapest  is  the  prevalence  of  one- 
story  houses,  which  are  subdivided  as  tenements  in 
such  a  way  as  to  give  each  family  only  one  main 
room,  with  a  very  small  kitchen  annex.  Housing 
reforms  in  Vienna  have  resulted  in  the  general  crea- 
tion of  the  large  tenement-house  of  several  stories, 
as  in  Berlin  and  Paris.  And  in  Budapest  the  new 
tendency  is  in  that  direction.  But  the  old  custom  of 
one-story  houses  that  has  always  prevailed  in  south- 
eastern Europe  is  still  chiefly  characteristic  of  house 
architecture  on  the  side  streets  and  in  the  unfashion- 
able bezirken  of  Budapest.  Before  1870,  four  fifths  of 
all  the  buildings  of  all  descriptions  were  of  one  story, 
and  barely  2  per  cent,  had  two  flights  of  stairs.  In 
1891,  two  thirds  were  still  one-story  buildings;  but 
the  three-  and  four-story  structures  had  begun  to 
multiply.  In  1881,  62  per  cent,  of  all  the  families  were 
living  on  ground  floors,  and  this  proportion  in  1891 
had  fallen  to  59.5.  In  Vienna,  26  per  cent,  of  the  house- 
holds were  on  the  ground  floor  (erdgeschoss),  while  in 
the  large  German  cities  the  average  is  from  13  to  20 
per  cent.  Up  one  flight  in  Budapest  are  21  per  cent,  of 

29* 


CHAP.  IX. 


Reduced 
percentage 

of  cellar 
dwellings. 


Compared 
with  Vienna. 


One-story 
tenement 
houses. 


High  tene- 
ments in 
Vienna. 


Gradual 
change  in 
Budapest. 


Households 

on  different 

floor-levels 

in  Budapest, 

Vienna,  and 

Berlin. 


454  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.     the  families,  while  9.4  are  on  the  third  floor,  and  only 

5  per  cent  climb  more  than  the  two  staircases.    In 
Vienna,  by  way  of  contrast,  26.5  per  cent,  are  up  one 
flight,  21.2  are  up  two,  and  24  ascend  three  or  more. 
In  Berlin,  on  the  other  hand,  35  per  cent,  of  the  house- 
holds are  three  or  more  flights  above  the  street  floor. 

Not  counting  the  small  kitchen  annexes,  or  an  occa- 
sional windowless  closet,  Mr.  K6r5si  found  in  1891 
that  the  one-room  dwellings  were  nearly  62  per  cent, 
of  the  whole  number,  and  that  two-room  dwellings 
were  nearly  21  per  cent.,  while  those  with  three  to  five 
rooms  were  15.3  per  cent.,  and  those  with  more 
°dweieiing°sm  than  five  rooms  were  only  2.2  per  cent.,  or  about  one 
in  fifty.  In  Breslau  and  one  or  two  other  large  Ger- 
man towns  the  house-room  is  shockingly  scant  for  the 
population ;  but  in  Budapest  it  is  more  restricted,  un- 
questionably, than  in  any  other  large  town  of  the 
civilized  world.  How  very  different  the  housing  con- 
ditions of  Vienna  have  become  under  the  impetus  of 
the  tax-exemptions  and  the  working  of  the  new  build- 
ing rules,  may  readily  be  shown.  The  comparative 
Vienna's  figures  present  a  striking  contrast  between  the  two 
trast.  capitals.  It  will  be  interesting,  perhaps,  to  include 
in  a  table  an  analysis  of  the  housing  conditions  of  the 
other  large  towns  of  the  Austrian  empire,  chief  of 
which  is  Bohemian  Prague,  after  which  come  Ital- 
ian Trieste,  German  Gratz,  Polish-Hebrew  Lemberg 
and  Cracow,  near  the  borders  of  the  Russian  empire, 
and  the  thrifty,  winsome  Moravian  capital,  Briinn. 

For  every  100  dwellings  (space  occupied  by  a  dis- 
tinct household)  the  census  inquiry  of  1891  found : 

Dwellings  In  Suda-  Tien-  Trir  Lem-  Cra- 

with  pest.        na.  Prague,  este.     Gratz.  berg.  c&w.  Briinn. 

1  room 61.7..  5.3  .16.4.  .11.7.  .17.6.  36.5.. 31.4..  4.6 

2  rooms .20.8.  .28.1.  .35.3.  .32.7.  .30.5.  .24.3.  .26.1.  .41.9 

*!  !°°mS «  1 1  53-°-  -35-8-  38-°-  -38-6.  -31.0.  .30.0.  .42.1 

4-5  rooms 6.6  ) 

6  and  more  rooms  2.2.  .13.5.  .12.5.  .17.6.  .13.8. .  8.2.  .12.5.  .11.4 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS  455 

When  account  is  made  of  the  extraordinary  preva-     CHAP.  ix. 
lence  in  Budapest  of  the  one-room  dwelling,  the  success 
of  the  health  administration  in  its  reduction  of  the 
death-rate  by  nearly  one  half  becomes  the  more  credit- 
able.   It  must  be  borne  in  mind,  however,  that  Buda-    Mitigating 
pest's  one-room  families  are  chiefly  in  one-story  houses,      stances. 
where  sunlight  and  air  penetrate  more  freely  than 
they  could  in  many-storied  slums  ;  and  that  Budapest 
spreads  its  population  over  a  comparatively  wide  area. 
The  municipal  territory  has  long  been  greater  than 
that  of  any  other  European  capital, —  comprising  nearly 
eighty  square  miles,  and  thus  being  larger  even  than 
Vienna's  newly  extended  bounds.     It  is  not  to  be  in-  T 

*  Large  mum- 

ferred  that  the  population  is  evenly  distributed  over  c>Pal  area- 
this  large  territory,  for  much  of  the  outlying  region  is 
made  up  of  gardens,  vineyards,  farms  and  forests. 
But  the  tendency  is  towards  a  comfortable  outflow 
over  ample  building  space.  And  it  is  evident  that 
the  gradual  replacement  of  one-story  tenement-houses 
by  those  of  three  or  more  stories  will  greatly  relieve 
the  population-pressure  upon  a  given  area.  The  city 
itself,  in  view  of  Mr.  Korftsi's  latest  disclosures,  has 
resolved  upon  a  remodeling  of  some  of  the  poorest 
quarters,  and  the  work  is  to  be  inaugurated  in  1896 
as  a  part  of  the  noteworthy  programme  of  improve-  A  new  pro- 
ments  with  which  it  has  been  determined  at  Budapest  ^oushfg  re- 
to  celebrate  Hungary's  millennial.  These  new  reforms 
will  not  be  as  costly  at  Budapest  as  corresponding 
ones  have  been  in  various  other  European  cities,  for 
the  twofold  reason  that  the  demolitions  will  chiefly 
affect  one-story  houses,  and  that  real-estate  in  Buda- 
pest commands  only  moderate  prices.  The  next  gen- 
eral census,  that  of  1901,  will  certainly  show  a 
conspicuous  improvement  in  the  housing  conditions 
of  the  Hungarian  capital,  even  though  it  may  be  fifty 
years  before  Vienna's  favorable  position  as  to  average 
amount  of  house-room  can  be  attained. 


456 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUKOPE 


CHAP.  ix. 


The  town  as 
a  rowner!ate 


Lots  sold  to 

private 

builders, 


taSs  hi 


Abattoirs 
markets, 


An  American  would  certainly  expect  to  find  real- 
estate  speculation  rife  in  a  city  growing  so  rapidly  as 
Budapest;  but  there  seems  to  be  practically  none. 
This  state  of  affairs  is  due,  at  least  in  large  part,  to 
the  fact  that  much  of  the  vacant  land  in  and  about  the 
town  belongs  to  the  municipality,  having  been  public 
property  for  a  long  time.  As  the  growth  of  the  town 
requires,  the  authorities  from  time  to  time  sell  build- 
ing sites  to  the  highest  bidders.  The  modern  school 
of  land-reformers  would  condemn  this  alienation,  and 
would  insist  that  the  fractions  of  the  social  domain 
should  be  leased  rather  than  sold;  but  the  south- 
eastern European  is  a  firm  believer  in  private  land- 
holding,  and  loves  to  possess  his  own  house  and  bit  of 
garden.  The  municipal  corporation  of  Budapest  is 
fortunate  in  possessing  all  the  ground  that  it  needs 
for  hospitals  and  public  objects.  This  remark,  how- 
ever, does  not  apply  to  the  Buda  side  of  the  river,  the 
old  town  of  Buda  having  at  an  early  day  parted  with 
all  its  landed  possessions.  Most  Hungarian  towns, 
it  may  be  observed,  as  well  as  those  of  Servia,  Bul- 
garia  and  the  Danubian  provinces  in  general,  continue 
to  hold  as  municipal  property  an  environing  area  of 
common  land  formerly  used  for  village  pasturage  and 
fuel-supply,  and  now  to  be  reckoned  upon  as  a  grow- 
ingly  valuable  municipal  asset. 

The  food-supply  of  Budapest  has  been  brought 
under  suitable  public  control.  The  great  municipal 
slaughter-house  is  one  of  the  establishments  in  which 
the  citizens  take  especial  pride.  It  is  very  imposing 
architecturally,  is  finely  appointed,  and,  as  a  public 
monopoly,  is  made  to  contribute  to  the  municipal 
coffers  while  serving  a  sanitary  end.  Connected  with 
it  are  the  public  cattle-markets,  which  well  repay  a 
visit  on  the  weekly  market-day  for  their  splendid 
herds  of  the  long-horned  white  oxen  of  Hungary  and 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS 


457 


Servia.  The  produce-markets  of  Budapest,  as  of  all 
other  towns  of  southeastern  Europe,  are  attended  by 
great  numbers  of  peasants  in  national  costume,  and 
are  as  picturesque  as  any  scenes  in  the  Orient.  The 
imposition  of  new  sanitary  rules  and  regulations  upon 
the  conduct  of  business  in  the  market-places  has  been 
a  marked  gain  for  the  health  of  the  people. 

To  continue  with  the  new  social  establishments  of 
the  municipality,  some  mention  must  be  made  of  the 
magnificent  general  hospital,  built  with  separate  brick 
pavilions,  according  to  the  most  approved  plans,  and 
occupying  spacious  and  beautiful  grounds.  In  a 
wooded  area  on  the  edge  of  the  city,  sufficiently  iso- 
lated without  being  inconveniently  remote,  has  been 
built  the  new  municipal  hospital  for  epidemic  dis- 
eases, which  conforms  to  all  the  latest  requirements 
of  sanitary  science.  Budapest  is  at  length  bringing 
infectious  diseases  under  control.  The  so-called 
u  prophylactic "  measures  of  obligatory  reports  by 
physicians,  of  prompt  isolation  of  every  case,  of  visits 
and  instruction  by  the  authorities  to  insure  proper 
care  and  treatment,  of  control  of  the  children  of 
families  in  which  are  cases  of  such  disease,  and  finally, 
of  disinfection  by  the  public  authorities,  are  employed 
with  success. 

Budapest  had  a  cholera  visitation  in  September, 
1892,  that  ended  in  February,  1893,  with  a  record  of 
935  cases  of  illness  and  525  deaths.  The  epidemic 
was  remarkably  well  managed  by  the  authorities.  It 
was  demonstrated  that  nearly  eveiy  case  of  attack 
resulted  from  the  use  of  unfikered  or  imperfectly 
filtered  water,  those  who  were  drinking  pure  water 
having  entire  immunity.  It  has  also  been  shown  by 
Mr.  Korosi  that  typhoid,  scarlet  fever,  diphtheria  and 
other  infectious  diseases  are  three  or  four  times  as 
prevalent  in  the  parts  of  the  town  that  are  not  supplied 


CHAP.  IX. 


Produce- 
markets. 


General 
hospital. 


Epidemic 
hospital. 


Prophylac- 
ticmeasures. 


Cholera  epi- 
demic of 
1892-93. 


Another 
demonstra- 
tion in  favor 
of  filtered 
water. 


458  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  with  filtered  water  as  in  those  that  have  the  best 
quality.  As  a  result  of  these  demonstrations,  the 
city  government  has  given  prompt  attention  to  a 
betterment  of  the  entire  supply. 

Attention  has  been  given  to  street  and  domestic 
scavenging.  The  sewer-system,  though  not  complete 
The  sewers,  and  perfect,  is  greatly  improved.  The  Danube  is  so 
large  a  stream  that  it  suffices  to  carry  off  all  the 
refuse  of  the  city,  and  no  separation  or  "  treatment n 
of  sewage  is  necessary.  Another  important  health- 
Public  baths,  measure  has  been  the  establishment  of  free  baths 
in  the  Danube,  for  summer  use, — these  institutions 
being  well  patronized, —  and  also  the  utilization  by 
the  authorities,  for  the  benefit  of  the  poor,  of  some 
of  the  hot  sulphur  springs,  the  curative  properties 
of  which  in  certain  diseases  are  very  famous.  As  a 
result  of  the  various  efforts  to  improve  the  health  and 
social  condition  of  the  people,  put  forth  intelligently 
and  humanely  by  the  public  authorities,  Budapest  is 
fast  exchanging  its  oriental  unwholesomeness  for  the 
comparative  healthfulness  of  an  occidental  city. 
Meanwhile  Mr.  Korosi's  elaborate  statistical  analyses 
throw  light  from  time  to  time  upon  every  doubtful 
point,  and  his  unequaled  library  of  inter-municipal 
statistics  enables  him  to  furnish  his  constituency 
with  stimulating  comparative  data. 

The  illumination  of  Budapest  has  been  a  monopoly 
The  city  and    in  the  hands  of  a  private  gas  company  whose  original 
supply.       charter  expired  in  1881,  and  which  obtained  a  renewed 
charter  for  some  fifteen  years  longer.   The  city  has  ob- 
tained gas  for  street -purposes  at  reduced  rates ;  has 
obliged  the  company  to  mitigate  its  charge  to  consu- 
mers in  accordance  with  a  sliding  scale  based  upon  the 
increase  in  aggregate  consumption ;  and  moreover  has 
collected  very  heavy  taxes  from  the  company.    It  re- 
served the  right  to  take  over  the  plant  and  business 


BUDAPEST,—  A  NEW  METEOPOLIS 


459 


at  an  appraised  valuation,  but  was  awaiting  the  de- 
velopment  of  electric  lighting  ;  and  there  was  a  strong 
probability  that  the  municipality  would  decide  to  enter 
upon  the  business  of  manufacturing  and  selling  the 
new  illuininant,  as  a  part  of  its  varied  programme  of 
expansion  fixed  for  the  year  1896. 

Street  transportation  has  also  been  kept  under  con- 
trol by  the  municipality.  A  united  tramway  system 
(horse-traction)  pays  street  rentals  and  large  taxes, 
The  company's  fares  are  fixed  by  law,  and  it  is  re- 
quired that  working  people  shall  be  carried  at  reduced 
rates  in  the  morning  and  evening.  At  the  expiration 
of  existing  charters,  the  street-railway  lines  and  their 
equipment  will  become  the  property  of  the  city,  with- 
out indemnity  to  the  private  owners.  Upon  the 
greater  ring-street  and  several  of  the  radial  avenues 
the  Budapest  Electric  City  Railway  Company  operates 
a  model  system  of  lines  upon  the  plan  of  an  insulated 
trolley  carried  in  a  metallic  underground  conduit. 
The  first  of  these  lines  was  opened  in  1889,  and  the 
company  has  steadily  extended  its  tracks,  under  fran- 
chises that  are  conspicuously  favorable  to  all  public 
interests.  From  the  technical  point  of  view,  the  un- 
derground electrical  current  has  been  an  unqualified 
success  in  Budapest,  this  Danubian  city  deserving 
credit  for  having  led  all  the  world  in  the  adoption  of 
advanced  and  perfect  appliances  in  electrical  street 
transit.  The  financial  affairs  of  the  company  are  as 
open  to  inspection  as  the  accounts  of  any  municipal 
department.  After  paying  large  taxes  to  the  city, 
contributing  to  insurance  and  sick  funds  for  its  em- 
ployees, making  liberal  yearly  payments  to  a  reserve 
tax  fund,  placing  a  considerable  sum  in  the  ordinary 
reserve  fund,  besides  provisions  for  interest,  and  for 
a  sinking-fund  to  redeem  its  bonds,  the  company  was 
able  in  1894  to  pay  the  shareholders  a  dividend  of  8 


CHAP.  ix. 

Electric 


gtreet 
railways. 


Finances  of 
the  com- 
pany. 


460  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  per  cent,  on  the  stock.  This,  however,  was  not  be- 
cause the  company  is  extraordinarily  prosperous,  but 
in  part  because  of  excellent  management,  and  above 
all  things  because  the  stock  represents  only  the  actual 
investment.  The  capitalization  of  the  system  is  only 
4,000,000  florins.  An  American  street-railway  com- 
pany would  hardly  have  been  content  to  construct  such 
a  system  and  put  it  into  operation  without  attempting 
to  make  it  earn  dividends  on  from  five  to  ten  times 
the  amount  that  the  Hungarian  laws  permit  to  stand 
as  the  capital  to  be  remunerated. 

Street-railways  of  all  kinds  have  been  excluded 
from  the  Andrassy-street ;  but  this  beautiful  avenue 
is  the  most  direct  approach  to  the  park  in  which  the 

An  under-    exhibition  of  1896  is  to  be  held ;  and  it  was  decided 

trie  road,  that  an  underground  road  from  the  heart  of  the  town 
on  the  Danube  front  ought  to  be  constructed  under 
the  Andrassy-strasse  to  the  exhibition  grounds.  Con- 
sequently, the  horse  railway  company  and  the  electric 
company  applied  for  a  joint  franchise  under  which 
they  were  ready  to  unite  in  constructing,  as  a  trunk- 
line  connecting  with  both  their  systems,  the  most 
perfectly  appointed  underground  road  ever  yet  built, 
with  electric  motors,  electric  lighting,  superior  venti- 
lation, and  every  convenience  that  ingenuity  could 
suggest.  It  was  expected  that  the  project  would  be 
executed.  Various  narrow-gauge  steam  railways  and 
Aco*npfeted  electric  overhead  trolley  lines  run  from  Budapest  to 

trantemsys~  neighboring  towns ;  and  the  whole  region  is  gradually 
acquiring  the  varied  and  complete  transit  facilities  of 
a  metropolitan  district.  Two  or  three  new  bridges 
across  the  Danube  will  have  been  begun  in  1896,  and 
these  links  will  permit  the  better  union  of  the  street- 
railway  systems  of  the  two  halves  of  the  town. 

The  prospects  for  Budapest's  continued  growth  as  a 
Danubian  metropolis  are  very  bright.  As  the  center 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METEOPOLIS 


461 


of  the  Hungarian  State-railway  system,  its  commercial 
importance  is  constantly  enhanced  by  the  development 
of  the  resources  of  the  country  and  the  corresponding 
increase  of  traffic.  And  it  is  no  longer  doubtful  that 
the  capital  will  be  the  gainer  to  an  enormous  extent 
by  the  new  "zone  tariff"  put  in  operation  on  the 
State-railway  system  in  August,  1889.  This  remarka- 
ble innovation  in  railroading  entirely  changes  the 
passenger-ticket  system.  From  Budapest  as  a  center 
14  zones  are  described,  the  first  having  a  radius  of  25 
kilometers  (about  15  miles).  The  second  is  a  belt 
lying  between  the  inner  circle  and  an  outer  one  drawn 
with  a  40  kilometer  radius ;  i.  e.,  its  width  is  15  kilo- 
meters. Successive  zones  have  a  radius  from  the 
Budapest  center  of  55, 70, 85, 100, 115, 130, 145, 160, 175, 
200,  and  225  kilometers,  while  to  the  fourteenth  zone 
are  assigned  all  distances  on  any  of  the  Hungarian 
State  lines  that  lie  more  than  225  kilometers  away 
from  the  capital.  For  any  point  in  each  of  these 
zones  the  fare  is  the  same.  The  new  rates  are  greatly 
reduced,  being  in  some  cases  one  half  and  in  other 
cases  less  than  one  fourth  the  former  rates.  The 
average  reduction  is  not  far  from  two  thirds.  Rail- 
way bookkeeping  is  of  course  simplified  by  the  new 
system,  and  traveling  has  received  an  unwonted  stim- 
ulus. It  is  now  conceded  that  the  innovation  is  a 
success  from  the  point  of  view  of  railway  financiering ; 
and  it  is  even  a  more  brilliant  success  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  commercial  and  social  progress  of  the 
capital  city.  It  has  given  new  movement  and  life  to 
the  sluggish  population  of  the  outlying  parts  of  Hun- 
gary. The  annual  number  of  persons  traveling  by 
rail  at  once  increased  several-fold.  The  working- 
men's  tickets  are  so  cheap,  moreover,  that  it  becomes 
readily  feasible  to  mobilize  labor  at  any  point  in 
Hungary  where  it  is  needed.  Great  results  in  like 


CHAP.  IX. 


Benefits 

from  the 

"zone-tariff" 

system. 


Main 

features  of 
the  system. 


462 


MUNICIPAL  GOVEKNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  IX. 


"Vicinity 
tariff." 


Growth  of 
the  city's 
population. 


Educational 
system  of 
Budapest. 


manner  are  following  the  more  recent  adoption  of 
zone  tariffs  and  reduced  rates  for  freight  traffic. 
The  "vicinity  tariff"  makes  short  rides  very  inex- 
pensive and  promotes  the  growth  of  outer  suburbs, 
while  bringing  hosts  of  country  people  to  the  city  on 
business  errands.  The  statistical  record  of  the 
changes  in  Hungarian  habits  of  travel  that  have  been 
brought  about  by  the  zone  system  and  the  era  of  low 
fares  inaugurated  by  the  lamented  Gabriel  von  Baross, 
Hungary's  daring  and  talented  young  minister  of 
commerce  and  transportation,  discloses  the  remark- 
able extent  of  an  innovation  that  is  destined  to  foster 
the  rapid  social  and  industrial  development  of  the 
country,  and  above  all  to  redound  to  the  prosperity 
of  Budapest.  The  city's  population  had  grown  from 
355,682  on  the  last  day  of  1880,  to  506,384  on  Decem- 
ber 31, 1890.  There  is  much  reason  to  think  that  the 
census  of  1900  will  show  an  even  greater  gain  for  the 
last  decade  of  the  century.  Budapest  in  the  millen- 
nial year  1896  would  seem  justified  in  estimating  the 
population  at  nearly  or  quite  600,000. 

The  educational,  literary,  and  artistic  progress  of 
Budapest  has  been  as  striking  since  1870  as  its  mate- 
rial progress.  The  educational  system  has  been  re- 
formed and  revivified  from  the  bottom  to  the  top.  At 
the  very  apex  is  the  University,  under  national  aus- 
pices and  support,  an  institution  fairly  comparable 
with  the  better  universities  of  Germany.  It  suffered 
somewhat  by  the  precipitate  expulsion  of  the  German 
faculty  and  the  too  sudden  transformation  from  a 
German  to  a  Hungarian  basis.  But  it  has  recovered, 
and  now  has  a  truly  national  character  and  influence. 
Another  important  official  educational  establishment, 
the  Royal  Polytechnic  Institute,  with  technical  courses 
in  engineering  and  applied  science,  flourishes  at  Bu- 
dapest. Then  comes  a  series  of  collegiate  establish- 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


463 


ments,  gymnasien  and  real-schulen,  some  of  which  are 
national  and  municipal,  while  others  are  denomina- 
tional with  public  subventions.  Below  these  are 
the  advanced  schools  for  boys  and  girls,  corresponding 
in  their  work  to  our  upper  grammar-  and  lower  high- 
school  grades,  and  having  certain  industrial  and  prac- 
tical features.  On  the  same  level  are  the  mercantile 
and  trade  schools.  And  then  come  the  numerous 
elementary  schools,  the  accommodations  of  which  are 
intended  to  be  equal  to  the  requirements  of  the  Com- 
pulsory Education  Act;  for  throughout  Austria  and 
Hungary  elementary  education  has  for  a  number  of 
years  been  obligatory  upon  all.  The  children  learn 
perfectly  both  the  Hungarian  and  the  German  lan- 
guages, and  not  infrequently  they  learn  something  of 
either  French  or  English. 

Because  devotion  to  their  speech,  and  admiration 
of  those  who  use  it  well  as  writers  or  orators,  have 
always  played  so  essential  a  part  in  the  actual  gov- 
ernmental and  institutional  life  of  the  Hungarians,  I 
may  be  pardoned  for  a  word  of  digression  about  it. 
The  Hungarians,  like  all  the  people  of  southeastern 
Europe,  are  ready  linguists.  But  the  ease  with  which 
they  acquire  other  languages  does  not  diminish  their 
loyalty  to  their  own.  The  Hungarian,  or  Magyar, 
speech  has  no  affinity  with  the  other  languages  of  the 
Austro-Hungarian  empire.  It  is  more  closely  related 
to  the  Turkish  than  to  any  other  tongue.  It  is  a  con- 
cise language,  flexible,  musical,  and  has  a  rich  vocab- 
ulary ;  and  its  most  enthusiastic  defenders  are  men 
who  cannot  be  charged  with  ignorance  of  the  capa- 
bilities of  the  three  leading  languages  of  western 
Europe.  An  extensive  and  growing  Magyar  litera- 
ture exists,  and  the  book-shops  of  Budapest  teem  with 
new  productions  in  all  fields  of  thought.  The  press 
of  Budapest  is  also  very  active.  Indeed,  the  Hunga- 


CHAP.  IX. 


Compulsory 
attendance. 


Influence  of 

the  Magyar 

language. 


464  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT   IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  rians  claim  that  nowhere  else  in  Europe  is  journalism 
journalism  so  free,  and  so  influential  in  molding  opinion  and 
andmgenVt!rn  guiding  affairs.  An  extraordinary  number  of  the 
leading  men  in  the  municipal  government  and  in  the 
national  parliament  are  or  have  been  journalists.  A 
Budapest  writer  has  lately  remarked  that  "  all  the  men 
who  can  be  regarded  as  distinguished  and  important 
in  the  field  of  Hungarian  politics  stand  in  close  rela- 
tion to  the  press:  Louis  Kossuth  was  a  journalist; 
Francis  Deak  entered  upon  his  work  of  adjusting 
Hungarian  and  Austrian  relations  with  a  series  of 
newspaper  articles;  and  in  the  list  of  journalist 
statesmen  stand  the  names  of  the  brilliant  Anton 
Csengery,  Baron  Sigismund  Kemeny,  Moritz  Jokai, 
Max  Falk,  Louis  Csernatony;  in  a  word,  the  most 
important  of  the  public  men  of  Hungary  are  journal- 
ists, for  even  the  Prime  Minister  Tisza  himself,  in  his 
time,  when  leader  of  the  opposition,  cultivated  public 
opinion  through  the  columns  of  a  Hungarian  jour- 
nal." In  Budapest  alone  there  are  now  more  than 
230  different  periodicals  published  in  the  Hunga- 
rian language,  while  there  are  at  least  forty  in  the 
German  tongue.  And  there  are  a  dozen  important 
daily  papers. 

The  musical  and  artistic  activity  of  Budapest  is 
very  considerable,  and  it  also  has  received  great  im- 
petus from  the  causes  which  have  led  to  the  recent 
expansion  of  all  interests  in  the  Magyar  capital.  The 
government  maintains  a  National  Theater  that  has 
a^mrafci-  played  an  important  part  in  the  patriotic  and  intel- 
pai  theaters.  ]ectual  life  of  the  people,  encouraging  poetic  and  lit- 
erary activity,  and  upholding  the  national  speech. 
Even  more  successful,  if  possible,  in  these  respects  is 
the  Volks  Theater,  which,  supported  by  the  municipal 
government  and  conducted  upon  the  most  popular 
plan,  fills  a  prominent  place  in  the  life  of  the  commu- 


BUDAPEST,—  A  NEW  METROPOLIS 


465 


Historical 


nity.    The  most  imposing  structure  devoted  to  musical    CHAP.  ix. 
and  dramatic  art  is  the  new  Royal  Opera,  supported  Royal  opera. 
by  the  government,  in  the  Andrassy-strasse.     It  is 
one  of  the  two  or  three  finest  opera-houses  in  Europe, 
its  magnificence  hardly  coming  short  of  those  in 
Vienna  and  Paris. 

If  Budapest  were  possessed  of  no  other  attractions 
whatsoever,  its  remarkable  hot  springs  and  mineral 
waters,  unequaled  for  the  variety  of  their  curative 
properties  by  any  other  group  of  medicinal  springs  in 
the  entire  world,  should  give  the  place  great  fame.  Its 
warm  spring  baths  are  very  ancient.  The  Romans 
utilized  them,  and  they  called  Buda  "Aquincum" 
(Five-waters),  with  reference  to  the  five  springs  that 
were  known  and  used.  The  Huns  also  prized  the 
healing  waters  ;  and  finally  the  Turks,  during  their 
period  of  domination,  built  great  public  baths,  and 
regarded  the  waters  as  possessed  of  the  highest  virtue. 
Some  of  these  baths  now  belong  to  the  municipality 
and  others  are  private  property.  For  the  most  part 
they  lie  on  the  Buda  side  of  the  river.  Especially 
noted  are  the  "  Kaiser-bad,"  the  "  Lucas-bad/'  and  the 
"  Konigs-bad,"  belonging  to  the  Josephsberg  group, 
and  lying  at  the  base  of  that  conspicuous  eminence. 
To  the  same  group  belong  the  baths  of  the  Marga- 
reta  Island.  Comfortable  hotels  adjoin  these  springs, 
and  the  bathing  establishments  for  the  most  part  are 
commodious  and  even  luxurious.  A  more  beautiful 
health-resort  than  the  "Margareten-Insel"can  be  found 
nowhere.  Another  group  includes  the  "  Raitzen-bad," 
the  "Bruck-bad,"  and  the  "Blocks-bad,"  lying  a  little 
distance  further  down  the  river  and  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  Blocksberg  promontory.  On  the  other  side  of 
the  city,  in  the  Stadtwaldchen  Park,  the  municipal 
authorities  have  a  hot-sulphur-bath  establishment, 
supplied  with  water  by  an  artesian  well  nearly  three 


baths" 


so 


466 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


CHAP.  IX. 


The  bitter- 
water 
springs. 


Prospective 

municipal 

revenue 

from  baths, 

etc. 


thousand  feet  deep.  The  saline  constituents  of  these 
various  sources  are  different,  and  some  of  the  springs 
are  recommended  for  one  class  of  diseases,  and  some 
for  another.  The  waters  are  used  either  externally, 
internally,  or  both,  according  to  the  case  to  be  treated. 
There  are  in  use  some  interesting  old  remains  of 
Turkish  bath-house  architecture,  notably  one  belong- 
ing to  the  municipality,  the  "Rudas-bad."  The 
modern  buildings  are  not  magnificent,  but*  they  are 
handsome  and  comfortable. 

On  the  edge  of  Buda,  in  a  little  plain  surrounded 
by  high  hills,  are  the  well-known  "  bitter-water " 
springs  which  have  made  the  name  of  Hungary  more 
famous  perhaps  than  any  other  article  of  export. 
These  curative  mineral  waters  are  bottled  in  vast 
quantities  and  sent  to  all  parts  of  the  world.  The 
"  Hunyadi "  water,  the  "  Franz-Joseph,"  the  "  Konigs- 
bitter-wasser,"  and  the  "  Rakoczy,"  are  the  best-known 
of  these  potent  Budapest  waters.  It  would  be  super- 
fluous to  discuss  here  their  remedial  qualities.  But 
the  baths,  springs,  and  wells  I  have  named,  with  various 
others  in  the  immediate  vicinity,  constitute  a  marvel- 
ous endowment  bestowed  by  nature  upon  this  beauti- 
ful city,  and  beyond  all  doubt  will  be  a  source  of  very 
great  wealth  and  fame  in  the  future.  As  at  Bath  in 
England,  these  healing  waters  of  Budapest  may  be- 
come at  some  time  a  property  yielding  a  direct  and 
large  municipal  revenue.  They  are  already  prized  as 
a  municipal  asset  of  large  prospective  value.  They 
also  begin  to  bear  a  definite  relation  to  the  labors  of 
the  public  health  department  and  of  the  hospital  and 
medical  relief  services,  while  enabling  the  city  to  give 
its  citizens — virtually  without  cost — the  luxury  and 
benefit  of  a  wonderful  variety  of  public  baths. 

Enough  has  been  said,  perhaps,  to  show  that  Buda- 
pest has  become  in  recent  years  one  of  the  best- 


BUDAPEST,— A  NEW  METROPOLIS  467 

appointed  of  modern  cities.  Its  streets  are  handsome  CHAP.  ix. 
and  clean,  asphalt  being  the  prevailing  material  of  the 
new  pavements ;  its  drainage  is  good ;  its  health-system 
is  producing  beneficent  results ;  its  water-supply  is  to 
be  enlarged  and  perfected;  its  local  transportation 
system  is  not  merely  adequate  but  exceptionally  good ; 
its  building  regulations  are  at  length  producing  a 
well-constructed  and  handsome  city;  and  its  provi- 
sions for  education  and  recreation  are  highly  credit- 
able. Its  public  buildings  are  of  good  architecture  p^^ 
and  of  considerable  variety.  A  splendid  new  build-  architecture. 
ing  has  been  erected  for  the  housing  of  the  municipal 
government,  the  offices  having  been  heretofore  dis- 
tributed among  several  city  buildings.  One  of  these, 
the  famous  "  Redoute  building,7'  is  an  imposing  struc- 
ture containing  a  vast  public  hall  for  balls  and  enter- 
tainments, the  ground  floor  being  used  as  a  fashionable 
restaurant  and  cafe.  Of  such  buildings  as  hospitals, 
schools,  academies  of  art  and  science,  the  city  has  a 
most  creditable  supply.  I  have  mentioned  already 
the  new  Hungarian  Pantheon ;  and  the  celebrations 
of  1896  are  also  to  include  the  opening  of  a  palatial 
Museum  of  Art  and  History,  a  Museum  of  Artistic 
Handwork,  and  a  new  Palace  of  Justice,  as  well  as  the 
new  Parliament  buildings  (which  have  cost  16,000,000 
florins),  and  a  permanent  Exhibition  Hall. 

Thus  the  Danube  Valley  has  at  length  begun  to 
show  development  under  the  magic  of  modern  politi- 
cal, social,  and  industrial  forces;  and  its  progress  progress  in 
within  the  coming  half -century  bids  fair  to  exceed 
that  of  some  newer  regions  of  the  Western  world. 
Budapest  proposes  to  wrest  from  Vienna  the  commer- 
cial ascendency  of  the  lower  Danube  valley ;  and  it  is 
possible  that  there  may  be  in  store  for  it  a  very  bril- 
liant political  future  as  the  capital  of  a  Danubian 
confederation  that  shall  include  Hungary  and  the 


468  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUROPE 

CHAP.  ix.  smaller  states  of  the  Southeast.  That  this  is  the 
ambition  of  many  Hungarians  is  perfectl}'  well  known; 
and  Hungary  is  preparing  to  play  an  uuprecedentedly 
important  role  in  the  political  life  of  Europe.  But 
whatever  may  be  the  political  future  of  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  empire  and  of  the  Balkan  peninsula,  it  is 
now  certain  enough  that  Budapest  is  to  take  and 

Budapest's    hold  its  place  among  the  great  cities  of  the  civilized 

place  and 

influence,  world.  Moreover,  the  example  of  Budapest  is  des- 
tined to  quicken  municipal  progress  in  Sofia,  Belgrade, 
Bucharest,  Athens,  and  Odessa,  and  even  in  Constan- 
tinople itself.  The  early  decades  of  the  twentieth 
century  will  witness  wonderful  transformations  in 
these  and  in  other  towns  of  southeastern  Europe. 


APPENDICES 


30* 


APPENDIX  I 
THE  BUDGET  OF  PARIS 

(AS  INTRODUCED  FOR  THE  YEAR  1894,  CONDENSED.) 


ORDINARY  RECEIPTS. 

FRANCS. 

The  Commune's  levy  of  addi- 
tional centimes,  the  dog  tax, 
and  certain  other  special 
impositions 32,692,100 

Certain  payments  from  the 
State  of  interest  on  funds 
in  the  Treasury,  etc.,  etc..  5,962,300 

Octroi 149,259,548 

Feesf or  registration  of  births, 
marriages,  etc.,  etc 250,000 

The  public  markets 8,030,825 

Public  scales 300,000 

Abattoirs 3,420,000 

Entrepots 3,086,400 

Income  from  municipal  prop- 
erty...   1,982,400 

Taxes  on  funerals 913,010 

Concessions,  ground  in  ceme- 
teries   2,334,365 

Legacies  and  gifts  for  public 
charity 31,428 

Concessions  on  streets  and  in 
public  parks 3,430,960 

Public  vehicles  (cabs,  street- 
cars, omnibuses,  etc.) 5,994,200 

Sewer  taxes 900,000 

Sale  of  old  materials  by  pub- 
lic works  department 329,700 

Individual  payments  for  part 
cost  of  paving  and  various 
public  improvements 4,315,186 

Appropriations  from  State 
and  Department  of  the 
Seine  toward  maintenance 
of  streets 4,400,000 

Special  street-cleaning  and 
scavenging  tax 3,120,000 

Aggregate  payments  from 
Paris  Gas  Company 16,500,000 

Receipts  from  waterworks. ..  15,666,550 

Operations  of  the  vidangeurs 
(night-soil  companies),  etc.  3,201,300 

Various  receipts  in  connec- 
tion with  the  educational 
institutions 4,671,573 

Contribution  of  State  to  ex- 
penses of  municipal  police.  10,489,950 

Miscellaneous  receipts 2,781,325 

New  resources  to  be  created.     6,793,200 

Total  Ordinary  Receipts. 290, 856, 320 

471 


ORDINARY  EXPENDITURES. 

FRANCS. 

Municipal  debt, — interest  and 
amortisement 110,900,528 

Sums  due  the  State,  for  col- 
lection of  taxes,  etc 6,371,200 

Administration  of  the  octroi.     9,190,160 

General  administrative  ex- 
penses    9,617,564 

Retirement  pensions,  etc 1,333,431 

Expenses  of  the  arrondisse- 
ment  mairies 872,600 

Cost  of  management  of  city 
property,  markets,  etc 1,496,956 

Inhumations 1,356,870 

Military  affairs  and  services 
of  protection 923,135 

"  Garde  republicaine  " 2,658,800 

Public  works  department,  sal- 
aries, etc 4,755,335 

Architecture  and  fine  arts  . . .     4,446,690 

"Voirie" 1,554,465 

Street  system 24,397,360 

Parks,  public  lighting,  etc. . .  12,322,645 

Waterworks  and  sewer  de- 
partment    8,556,080 

College  Rollin  and  subven- 
tions to  higher  instruction .  1,542,790 

Public  school  system 25,892,113 

Public  charity  of  all  kinds. . .  26,848,940 

Miscellaneous  outlays 429,484 

Prefecture  of  police 29,520,330 

Fire  department 2,611,400 

Municipal  laboratory 371,550 

Commission  to  examine  ca- 
pacity of  "  cochers  " 27,500 

Reserve  funds 1,058,393 

Special  reserve  "  non-dispon- 
ible  " 1,800,000 


Total   of   Ordinary    Ex- 

penses 290,856,320 


APPENDIX  II 


CONDENSED   BUDGET  (STADTHAUSHALT) 
OF  BERLIN 


DEPARTMENTS. 

1891-'92. 

1892-'93. 

INCOME. 
In  marks. 

OUTGO. 
In  marks. 

INCOME. 
In  marks. 

OUTGO. 
In  marks. 

I.  KAMMEBEI-VEBWALTUNG, 
Comprising  rentals  of  real 
estate  owned  by  the  city, 
etc.           

866,217 

5,186,279 

465,450 
2,254,320 

368,838 

12,320,370 
5,537,061 
320,020 
18,491,936 
550,941 

12,122,610 
2,052,126 
1,469,250 

959,032 
472 

155,903 

838,754 

4,607,276 

465,450 
2,405,065 

330,065 

12,740,371 
5,821,205 
396,388 
16,151,882 
558,105 

12,331,233 
2,066,357 
1,038,052 

988,036 

155,082 

II.  DEPAKTMENT  OF  MUNICIPAL 
WORKS, 
1.  (a)  Net  surplus  earnings 

(b)  Income  from  accumu- 
lated gas-works  reserve 

2.  Waterworks,  net  surplus 
profits  
3.  Sewer-works,  net  deficit  of 
department  
4.  Central  cattle-market,  net 

2,382,379 

2,526,765 

III.  TAX  DEPABTMENT, 
1.  Bent  tax 

I    29,249 

2,780 
338,731 

I    21,754 

6,657 
295,592 

2.  House  tax  

3.  Dog  tax  

4.  Municipal  income  tax  
5.  Malt  tax  

IV.  CAPITAL  AND  DEBT  DEPABT- 
MENT, 
Total  receipts  and  outgoes 
on  account  of  various  de- 
partments of  public  works. 
V.  EDUCATIONAL  DEPABTMENT, 
Common  schools,  higher  in- 
struction, etc  

13,857,349 
13,136,712 
8,415,319 

4,137,841 

14,267,265 
13,644,849 
8,774,517 

4,495,468 

VI.  POOR-BELIEF  DEPARTMENT, 
Aggregate   accounts  of   all 
forms  of  charitable  aid  .  .  . 
VII.  HEALTH  AND  HOSPITAL  DE- 
PARTMENT, 
Various     institutions     and 
agencies  -.  

APPENDIX  II.— BUDGET  OF  BERLIN 


473 


1891-'92. 

1892-93. 

DEPARTMENTS. 

INCOME, 

OUTGO. 

INCOME. 

OUTGO. 

In  marks 

In  marks. 

In  marks. 

In  marks. 

VIIL  PARK    AND    GABDEN    DE- 

PABTMENT, 

Total  of  ordinary  items  

21,324 

519,019 

44,220 

864,394 

Establishment   of   Victoria 

Park  

2,500,000 

2,194,275 

IX.  BUILDING  DEPARTMENT, 

1.  Administration,     repair, 

and  construction  of  muni- 

cipal buildings  

3,007,813 

6,326,341 

2,607,189 

6,145,027 

2.  Street  and  bridge  work.  . 

5,572,906 

13,919,527 

7,477,473 

14,328,596 

X.  COSTS  OF  ADMINISTRATION, 

Various  fees  and  salaries  of 

758,498 

6,751,381 

972,242 

7,175,611 

XI.  POLICE  ADMINISTRATION. 

Including  municipal  night- 

watch,  and  fire  department. 

569,163 

3,290,154 

584,398 

3,331,669 

XII.  LIGHTING,  CLEANING,  AND 

SPRINKLING  OF  STREETS  . 

127,545 

2,283,976 

164,121 

2,915,452 

XIII.  VARIOUS  RECEIPTS  AND  EX- 

PENSES   

8,930,152 

3,695,385 

11,391,251 

1,030,681 

GENERAL  TOTAL  

84,471,095 

81,436,322 

84,007,960 

79,979,379 

GROSS  REVENUES  AND  EXPENDI- 

TURES. 

The  above  accounts  include  only 

the  net  balances  of  gain  or  loss  for 

the  eight  departments  that  have 

their  own  distinct  treasuries.  These 

are  (1)  the  Gas-works,  (2)  Water- 

works,   (3)    Sewers    and    sewage 

farms,  (4)  Cattle-markets,  (5)  Abat- 

toirs, (6,  7,  and  8)  various  market 

establishments. 

Total  incomes  and  outgoes  of  these 

special  treasuries  

65,538,524 

54,204,087 

61,403,640 

51,231,433 

Operations  of  the  Central  Munici- 

pal Treasury,  as  shown  above  .  . 

84,471,095 

81,436,322 

84,007,960 

79,979,379 

Total  .. 

138.491.518 

124.122.308 

133.864,592 

119,663,804 

APPENDIX  III. 
THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE. 


CHIEF    PROVISIONS    OF    THE    LAW   OF    APEIL    5,  1884,   ON 
MUNICIPAL  ORGANIZATION. 

TITLE  I.    THE  COMMUNES. 

ART.  1.  The  municipal  corps  of  each  commune  is  composed  of  the  mu- 
nicipal council,  the  mayor,  and  one  or  more  adjuncts. 

ART.  2.  A  change  in  the  name  of  a  commune  is  effected  by  order  of  the 
President  of  the  Republic  on  demand  of  the  municipal  council,  the  council- 
general  and  the  Council  of  State  consenting. 

ART.  5.  A  new  commune  cannot  be  erected  except  by  virtue  of  a  law, 
upon  the  advice  of  the  council-general,  the  Council  of  State  consenting. 

TITLE  H.     THE  MUNICIPAL  COUNCILS. 

CHAPTER  I. — FORMATION  OP  THE  MUNICIPAL  COUNCILS. 
ART.  10.  The  municipal  council  is  composed  of  10  members  in  communes 
of  500  inhabitants  or  less ; 

of  12  in  those  of       501  to    1,500  inhabitants ; 

16  "  1,501  to    2,500  " 

21  "  2,501  to    3,500  " 

23  "  3,501  to  10,000  " 

27  "  10,001  to  30,000  " 

30  "  30,001  to  40,000  " 

32  "  40,001  to  50,000  " 

34  "  50,001  to  60,000  " 

36  "  60,001  or  more. 

In  towns  divided  into  several  mayoralties  [Paris  and  Lyons]  the  number 
of  councilors  will  be  increased  by  three  for  each  mayoralty. 

ART.  11.  The  election  of  members  of  the  municipal  council  is  by  a  gen- 
eral ticket  (scrutin  de  liste)  for  the  entire  commune. 

Nevertheless,  the  commune  may  be  divided  into  electoral  sections,  each 
of  which  will  elect  a  number  of  councilors-  proportioned  to  the  number  of 
registered  electors,  but  only  in  the  two  following  cases : 

(1)  When  it  is  composed  of  several  distinct  and  separate  groups  of  inhab- 
itants; in  this  case,  no  district  may  have  less  than  two  councilors; 

(2)  When  the  total  population  of  the  commune  is  more  than  10,000  in- 

474 


APPENDIX  HI.— THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE         475 

habitants.  In  this  case,  a  section  cannot  be  composed  of  parts  of  territory 
belonging  to  different  cantons  or  municipal  arrondissements.  Parts  of  ter- 
ritory having  their  own  property  (des  biens  propres)  cannot  be  divided  be- 
tween different  electoral  districts. 

No  one  of  these  sections  may  have  less  than  four  councilors. 

In  every  case  where  the  division  into  sections  is  authorized,  each  must  be 
composed  of  contiguous  territory. 

ART.  13.  The  prefect  may,  by  a  special  order  published  at  least  ten  days 
in  advance,  divide  the  commune  into  a  number  of  voting  precincts  which 
will  concur  in  the  election  of  the  same  councilors. 

An  electoral  ticket  will  be  delivered  to  each  elector ;  this  ticket  will  indi- 
cate the  location  of  the  polls  at  which  he  is  to  vote. 

ART.  14.  The  municipal  councilors  are  elected  by  direct  universal  suffrage. 

All  French  citizens  of  the  age  of  twenty-one  years  and  upwards,  not  com- 
jig  within  any  case  of  incapacity  provided  for  by  law,  are  electors. 

The  electoral  lists  include :  (1)  all  electors  who  have  their  real  domicile 
in  the  commune  and  have  lived  there  for  at  least  six  months ;  (2)  those  who 
have  been  entered  on  the  list  for  one  of  the  four  direct  taxes  or  on  the  list 
for  the  road  duty  (prestations  en  nature),  and,  if  they  do  not  reside  in  the  com- 
mune, have  declared  their  intention  of  exercising  their  electoral  rights  there. 
The  members  of  the  families  of  the  electors  comprised  under  the  head  of  the 
prestation  en  nature,  even  though  they  are  not  personally  included,  and  the 
inhabitants  who,  by  reason  of  their  age  or  their  health,  have  ceased  to  be 
subject  to  this  duty,  are  also  registered  by  the  terms  of  this  paragraph;  (3) 
those  who  by  virtue  of  article  2  of  the  treaty  of  May  10,  1871,  have  chosen 
French  nationality  and  declared  their  residence  to  be  fixed  in  the  commune, 
in  conformity  with  the  law  of  June  19,  1871 ;  (4)  those  who  are  subject  to 
an  obligatory  residence  in  the  commune  in  the  capacity  either  of  ministers 
of  religious  bodies  recognized  by  the  State,  or  of  public  officials. 

Citizens  who,  not  fulfilling  the  conditions  of  age  and  residence  above  in- 
dicated at  the  time  of  the  making  of  the  lists  fulfil  them  before  the  final 
closure,  are  likewise  registered. 

Absence  from  the  commune  resulting  from  military  service  will  not  in- 
volve any  prejudice  to  the  rules  above  set  forth  for  registration  on  the' 
electoral  lists. 

ART.  15.  The  assembly  of  electors  is  convened  by  order  of  the  prefect. 

The  order  of  convocation  is  published,  in  the  commune,  at  least  fifteen 
days  before  the  election,  which  must  always  take  place  on  Sunday.  It 
fixes  the  place  where  the  balloting  will  take  place,  as  well  as  the  hours  at 
which  it  is  to  oe  begun  and  concluded. 

ART.  16.  When  there  is  occasion  to  elect  successors  of  municipal  coun- 
cilors elected  by  sections,  in  conformity  with  article  11  of  this  law,  these 
elections  will  be  held  by  the  sections  to  which  the  councilors  belong. 

ART.  17.  The  polls  are  presided  over  by  the  mayor,  the  adjuncts,  the 
municipal  councilors  in  the  order  of  the  list,  and,  in  case  they  are  pre- 
vented, by  electors  designated  by  the  mayor. 


476  MUNICIPAL  GOVEKNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

AKT.  18.  The  president  alone  has  police  authority  over  the  assembly. 
This  assembly  cannot  consider  other  matters  than  the  election  which  is  as- 
signed to  it.  All  discussion  and  all  deliberation  are  forbidden. 

ART.  20.  The  balloting  continues  only  one  day. 

AKT.  30.  No  one  is  elected  on  the  first  ballot  unless  he  has  received  :  (1) 
an  absolute  majority  of  the  votes  cast;  (2)  a  number  of  votes  equal  to  one 
fourth  the  number  of  registered  electors.  On  the  second  ballot,  the  elec- 
tion is  by  relative  majority,  whatever  the  number  of  voters.  If  different 
candidates  obtain  the  same  number  of  votes  the  oldest  is  declared  elected. 

In  the  case  of  a  second  ballot  the  assembly  is  convened  bylaw  on  the 
following  Sunday.  The  mayor  makes  the  necessary  announcements. 

ART.  31.  All  the  electors  of  the  commune  and  the  citizens  entered  on  the 
list  for  direct  taxes,  or  proving  that  they  should  be  so  entered  on  the  first 
of  January  of  the  year  of  election,  of  the  age  of  twenty-five  years  and  up- 
wards, are  eligible  to  the  municipal  council,  subject  to  the  restrictions  ex- 
pressed in  the  last  paragraph  of  this  article,  and  in  the  two  following  ar- 
ticles. 

However,  the  number  of  councilors  who  do  not  reside  in  the  commune  at 
the  time  of  election  must  not  exceed  one  fourth  of  the  members  of  the 
council.  If  it  exceeds  this  number,  the  preference  is  determined  according 
to  the  rules  laid  down  in  article  49. 

i  Soldiers  and  employees  of  the  land  and  sea  armies  in  active  service  are  not 
eligible. 

ART.  32.  The  following  cannot  be  municipal  councilors : 

(1)  Persons  deprived  of  the  electoral  right ; 

(2)  Those  who  are  provided  for  by  a  judicial  council  (conseil  judiciaire) ; 
,  (3)  Those  who  are  exempted  from  contributing  to  the  communal  taxes 

and  those  who  are  aided  by  the  bureaus  of  beneficence ; 

(4)  Domestics  attached  exclusively  to  the  person. 

.  ART.  33.  The  following  are  not  eligible  in  the  jurisdiction  in  which  they 
perform  their  functions : 

(1)  The  prefects,  sub-prefects,  secretaries  general,  and  councilors  of  the 
prefecture ;  and,  in  the  colonies  governed  by  this  law,  the  governors,  di- 
rectors of  the  interior,  and  members  of  the  privy  council; 

(2)  The  commissaries  of  police  and  police  officers ; 

(3)  Magistrates  of  courts  of  appeal  and  of  tribunals  of  first  instance,  with 
the  exception  of ,  substitute  judges  to  whom  examination  (Vinstructiori)  is 
jiot  entrusted; 

.  (4)  The  incumbent  justices  of  the  peace ; 

(5)  The  accountants  of  the  communal  funds  and  the  contractors  for 
municipal  services; 

(6)  The  public  school  teachers ; 

((7)  The  employees  of  the  prefecture  and  of  the  sub-prefecture ; 

(8)  The  engineers  and  conductors  of  bridges  and  embankments  (chausstes') 
charged  with  service  on  the  city  and  parish  roads  (voirie  urbaine  et  vidnale), 
.and  jthe  ^overseers  of  roads ; 


APPENDIX  HI.—  THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE        477 

(9)  Ministers  in  the  exercise  of  a  legally  recognized  form  of  worship ; 

(10)  Salaried  agents  of  the  commune,  among  whom  are  not  included  those 
who,  being  public  functionaries  or  exercising  an  independent  profession, 
receive  pay  from  the  commune  only  by  reason  of  the  services  which  they 
render  in  the  practice  of  their  profession. 

ART.  34.  The  functions  of  municipal  councilor  are  incompatible  with 
those : 

(1)  Of  prefect,  sub-prefect,  and  secretary  general  of  a  prefecture ; 

(2)  Of  commissary  of  police  and  police  officer; 

(3)  Of  governor,  director  of  the  interior,  and  member  of  the  privy  council 
in  the  colonies. 

The  officials  named  in  this  article  who  are  elected  members  of  a  municipal 
council  will  have  ten  days'  time,  beginning  with  the  proclamation  of  the 
result  of  the  ballot,  in  which  to  choose  between  the  acceptance  of  the  man- 
date and  continuance  in  office.  In  default  of  a  declaration  addressed  within 
this  time  to  their  superior  officers,  they  will  be  considered  to  have  chosen 
to  continue  in  office. 

ART.  35.  No  one  can  be  a  member  of  more  than  one  municipal  council. 

Ten  days'  time,  counting  from  the  proclamation  of  the  result  of  the  bal- 
lot, is  allowed  to  a  municipal  councilor  chosen  in  more  than  one  commune 
in  which  to  make  his  declaration  of  choice.  This  declaration  is  addressed 
to  the  prefects  of  the  departments  interested. 

If,  within  this  time,  the  councilor-elect  has  not  made  known  his  choice, 
he  is  assigned  by  law  to  the  council  of  the  commune  in  which  the  number 
of  electors  is  the  least. 

In  communes  of  501  inhabitants  or  more,  ancestors  and  descendants, 
brothers,  and  marriage  relations  of  the  same  degree,  cannot  be  simultane- 
ously members  of  the  same  municipal  council. 

Article  49  is  applicable  to  the  case  covered  by  the  preceding  paragraph. 

ART.  41.  The  municipal  councils  are  elected  for  four  years.  They  are 
renewed  in  their  entirety,  on  the  first  Sunday  in  May,  throughout  France, 
even  when  they  have  been  elected  in  the  interval. 

ART.  42.  When  the  municipal  council  is  found  to  be  reduced  by  unex- 
pected vacancies  to  three  fourths  of  its  members,  complementary  elections 
are  held  within  the  period  of  two  months,  counting  from  the  last  vacancy. 

However,  in  the  six  months  preceding  the  entire  renewal,  the  comple- 
mentary elections  are  not  obligatory  except  where  the  municipal  council 
has  lost  more  than  half  its  members. 

In  the  communes  which  are  divided  into  districts,  partial  elections  are 
always  held  when  a  district  has  lost  half  its  councilors. 

ART.  43.  A  municipal  council  can  be  dissolved  only  by  a  decree  issued  by 
the  President  of  the  Republic  in  the  council  of  ministers  and  published  in 
the  Journal  officiel,  and,  in  the  colonies  governed  by  this  law,  by  order  of 
the  governor  in  privy  council,  inserted  in  the  official  journal  of  the  colony. 

In  case  of  urgency,  it  may  be  provisionally  suspended  by  an  order  issued 
by  the  prefect,  who  must  immediately  report  to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior. 


478  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

The  duration  of  the  suspension  cannot  exceed  one  month.  In  the  colonies 
above  specified,  the  municipal  council  may  be  suspended  by  an  order  issued 
by  the  governor.  The  duration  of  the  suspension  cannot  exceed  one 
month. 

ART.  44.  In  case  of  the  dissolution  of  a  municipal  council  or  the  resigna- 
tion of  all  its  actual  members  and  when  no  municipal  council  can  be  created, 
a  special  delegation  performs  its  functions. 

In  the  eight  days  following  the  dissolution  or  the  acceptance  of  the  res- 
ignation, this  special  delegation  is  appointed  by  decree  of  the  President 
of  the  Republic,  and,  in  the  colonies,  by  order  of  the  governor. 

The  number  of  members  composing  it  is  fixed  at  three  in  communes 
where  the  population  does  not  exceed  35,000  inhabitants.  The  number  may 
be  increased  to  seven  in  towns  of  a  greater  population. 

CHAPTER  II. — FUNCTIONS  OF  THE  MUNICIPAL  COUNCILS. 

ART.  46.  The  municipal  councils  meet  in  ordinary  session  four  times  a 
year :  in  February,  May,  August,  and  November. 

The  length  of  each  session  is  fifteen  days ;  it  may  be  prolonged  by  the 
authorization  of  the  sub-prefect. 

The  session  during  which  the  budget  is  discussed  may  last  six  weeks. 

During  the  ordinary  sessions  the  municipal  council  may  consider  any 
matter  which  comes  within  its  powers. 

ART.  47.  The  prefect  or  the  sub-prefect  may  order  an  extraordinary  con- 
vocation of  the  municipal  council.  The  mayor  also  may  call  the  municipal 
council  together  whenever  he  considers  it  necessary.  He  is  bound  to  con- 
vene it  when  requested  so  to  do  by  a  majority  of  the  municipal  council.  In 
either  case,  at  the  time  when  he  summons  the  council,  he  gives  notice  to 
the  prefect  or  the  sub-prefect  of  the  meeting  and  the  reasons  which  render 
it  necessary. 

The  order  of  convocation  contains  a  statement  of  the  special  and  stated 
objects  for  which  the  council  is  to  assemble,  and  the  council  may  consider 
only  these  matters. 

ART.  48.  Every  order  of  convocation  is  issued  by  the  mayor.  It  is  men- 
tioned on  the  record  of  proceedings,  posted  on  the  door  of  the  mayoralty 
and  addressed  in  writing  to  the  residences,  three  days  at  least  before  the 
day  of  the  meeting. 

In  case  of  urgency,  the  delay  may  be  shortened  by  the  prefect  or  the 
sub-prefect. 

ART.  49.  The  municipal  councilors  rank  in  the  order  of  the  list. 

The  order  of  the  list  is  determined,  even  when  there  are  electoral  dis- 
tricts :  (1)  by  the  date  of  the  first  election ;  (2)  between  councilors  elected 
the  same  day,  by  the  greatest  number  of  votes  obtained ;  (3)  and,  in  case 
of  equality  of  votes,  by  priority  of  age. 

ART  50.  The  municipal  council  may  deliberate  only  when  a  majority  of 
its  members  exercising  their  functions  are  present  at  the  meeting. 

When,  after  two  successive  convocations,  duly  issued  with  an  interval  of 


APPENDIX  HI.— THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE        479 

at  least  three  days,  the  municipal  council  is  not  assembled  in  sufficient 
number,  the  proceedings  held  in  accordance  with  the  third  convocation  are 
valid,  whatever  the  number  of  members  present. 

AKT.  51.  Questions  are  decided  by  an  absolute  majority  of  those  voting. 
In  case  of  a  tie,  except  in  the  case  of  a  secret  ballot,  the  vote  of  the  presi- 
dent is  decisive.  The  vote  is  taken  publicly  on  demand  of  one  fourth  of 
the  members  present ;  the  names  of  the  voters,  with  their  votes,  are  entered 
upon  the  record. 

The  voting  is  by  secret  ballot  whenever  one  third  of  the  members  present 
request  it,  or  in  the  case  of  an  election  or  nomination. 

In  the  latter  case,  after  two  secret  ballots,  if  none  of  the  candidates  has 
obtained  an  absolute  majority,  a  third  ballot  is  taken,  and  the  election  is 
decided  by  relative  majority  ;  in  case  of  a  tie,  the  oldest  is  declared  elected. 

ART.  52.  The  mayor,  or,  in  his  default,  his  substitute,  presides  over  the 
municipal  council. 

In  the  sessions  in  which  the  official  statements  of  the  mayor  are  debated, 
the  municipal  council  elects  its  president. 

In  this  case,  the  mayor  may,  even  though  he  is  no  longer  in  office,  take 
part  in  the  discussion ;  but  he  must  retire  at  the  time  of  the  vote.  The 
president  reports  the  proceedings  directly  to  the  sub-prefect. 

ART.  53.  At  the  beginning  of  each  session  the  municipal  council  appoints 
one  or  more  of  its  members  to  perform  the  functions  of  secretary  during  its 
continuance. 

ART.  54.  The  sessions  of  the  municipal  councils  are  public.  Never- 
theless, on  demand  of  three  members  or  of  the  mayor,  the  municipal  coun- 
cil, by  a  rising  vote  without  debate,  decides  whether  it  will  resolve  itself 
into  a  secret  committee. 

ART.  59.  The  municipal  council  may  appoint,  in  the  course  of  each  ses- 
sion, committees  charged  with  studying  questions  submitted  to  the  council 
either  by  the  administration  or  by  the  initiative  of  one  of  its  members. 

The  committees  may  hold  their  meetings  in  the  interval  between  the 
sessions. 

They  are  convened  by  the  mayor,  who  is  their  president  by  law,  within 
the  eight  days  following  their  appointment,  or  in  a  shorter  time  on  a  demand 
of  a  majority  of  the  members  composing  them.  In  this  first  meeting,  the 
committees  appoint  a  vice-president  who  may  convene  and  preside  over  them, 
if  the  mayor  is  absent  or  prevented  from  acting. 

ART.  60.  Every  member  of  the  municipal  council  who,  without  reasons 
recognized  as  legitimate  by  the  council,  has  missed  three  successive  sessions, 
may,  after  having  been  permitted  to  make  his  excuses,  be  declared  by  the 
prefect  to  have  resigned,  subject  to  appeal  within  ten  days  of  the  notifica- 
tion to  the  council  of  the  prefecture. 

CHAPTER  III. —  POWERS  OP  THE  MUNICIPAL  COUNCILS. 

ART.  61.  The  municipal  council  regulates  by  its  deliberations  the  affairs 
of  the  commune. 


480  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

It  gives  its  advice  whenever  such  advice  is  required  by  the  laws  and  reg- 
ulations, or  when  it  is  demanded  by  the  superior  administration. 

It  protests,  if  there  is  occasion,  against  the  quota  assigned  to  the  com- 
mune in  the  levying  of  the  apportioned  taxes. 

It  votes  on  all  subjects  of  local  interest. 

It  makes  out  each  year  a  list  containing  a  number  double  that  of  the  as- 
sessors and  substitute  assessors  to  be  appointed ;  and  from  this  list  the  sub- 
prefect  appoints  the  five  assessors  required  by  article  nine  of  the  law  of  3 
frimaire  an  VII,  and  the  five  substitute  assessors. 

ART.  63.  The  following  are  null  by  law : 

(1)  Proceedings  of  a  municipal  council  bearing  upon  a  subject  foreign  to 
its  powers  or  carried  on  outside  of  its  legal  meeting. 

(2)  Proceedings  in  violation  of  a  law  or  a  regulation  of  public  adminis- 
tration. 

ART.  68.  Proceedings  bearing  upon  the  following  subjects  take  effect  only 
after  having  been  approved  by  the  superior  authority : 

(1)  The  conditions  of  leases  the  duration  of  which  exceeds  eighteen 
years ; 

(2)  The  alienation  and  exchange  of  communal  property ; 

(3)  The  acquisition  of  immovables ;  new  buildings;  the  entire  or  partial 
reconstruction  of  buildings ;  the  projects,  plans  and  estimates  of  important 
repairs  and  of  maintenance,  when  the  expense,  added  to  the  expenses  of  the 
same  nature  during  the  current  fiscal  year,  exceeds  the  limits  of  the  or- 
dinary and  extraordinary  resources  which  the  communes  may  raise  without 
special  authorization ; 

(4)  Contracts; 

(5)  A  change  in  the  use  of  communal  property  already  devoted  to  a  pub- 
lic service ; 

(6)  Waste  pasture  land  ; 

(7)  The  classification,  reclassification,  straightening  or  lengthening,  the 
enlargement,  abolition  and  naming  of  streets  and  public  places,  the  crea- 
tion and  abolition  of  walks,  squares  or  public  gardens,  market  places, 
shooting  places,  or  race  courses,  the  establishment  of  plans  for  the  laying 
out  and  leveling  of  the  municipal  public  ways,  modifications  of  the  plans  of 
construction  adopted,  the  tariff  of  highway  duties  (droits  de  voirie),  the 
tariff  of  fees  for  stands  and  locations  on  any  part  of  the  main  public  high- 
ways, and,  in  general,  tariffs  of  the  various  dues  to  be  collected  for  the  profit 
of  the  communes  by  virtue  of  Art.  133  of  this  law ; 

(8)  The  acceptance  of  gifts  and  legacies  made  to  the  commune  when  there 
are  charges  or  conditions  or  when  they  give  way  to  the  demands  of  the 
families ; 

(9)  The  communal  budget; 

(10)  The  supplementary  credits ; 

(11)  Extraordinary  contributions  and  loans,  except  in  the  case  provided 
for  by  Art.  141  of  this  law; 

(12)  The  octrois,  in  the  cases  provided  for  by  Art.  137  and  138  of  this  law ; 


APPENDIX  III.— THE  FBENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE         481 

(13)  The  establishment,  the  abolition  or  the  removal  of  fairs  and  markets 
other  than  the  simple  markets  of  supply. 

ART.  70.  The  municipal  council  is  always  asked  to  give  its  advice  on  the 
following  matters : 

(1)  Regulations  relative  to  public  worship ; 

(2)  Regulations  relative  to  the  distribution  of  public  aid ; 

(3)  Projects  for  the  laying  out  and  leveling  of  the  main  thoroughfares  in 
the  interior  of  cities,  towns,  and  villages ; 

(4)  The  creation  of  bureaus  of  beneficence  (bureaux  de  bienfaisance) ; 

(5)  The  budgets  and  accounts  of  hospitals,  alms-houses,  and  other  chari- 
table and  benevolent  establishments,  and  of  vestries  and  other  managing 
boards  of  religious  bodies  whose  ministers  are  salaried  by  the  State ;  au- 
thorizations to  acquire,  alienate,  borrow,  exchange,  sue  or  compromise 
(transiger),  requested  by  the  same  establishments;  the  acceptance  of  gifts 
and  legacies  which  are  made  to  them ; 

(6)  In  short,  all  matters  on  which  the  municipal  councils  are  required  by 
the  laws  and  regulations  to  give  their  advice,  and  those  on  which  they  are 
consulted  by  the  prefect. 

When  the  municipal  council,  regularly  summoned  and  convened  for  the 
purpose,  refuses  or  neglects  to  give  its  advice,  the  matter  may  be  decided 
without  it. 

ART.  71.  The  municipal  council  considers  the  official  reports  which  are 
annually  submitted  to  it  by  the  mayor,  in  conformity  with  Art.  151  of  this 
law. 

It  hears,  debates  and  acts  upon  the  accounts  of  the  receivers,  subject  to 
final  disposition,  in  conformity  with  Art.  157  of  this  law. 

TITLE  III.— THE  MAYORS  AND  THE  ADJUNCTS. 

ART.  73.  There  are  in  each  commune  a  mayor  and  one  or  more  adjuncts 
elected  from  among  the  members  of  the  municipal  council. 

The  number  of  adjuncts  is  one  in  communes  of  2,500  inhabitants  or  less, 
and  two  in  those  of  2,501  to  10,000.  In  communes  of  a  greater  population, 
there  will  be  one  additional  adjunct  for  every  additional  25,000  inhabitants, 
but  the  number  of  adjuncts  will  not  exceed  twelve  except  in  the  city  of 
Lyons,  where  the  number  is  fixed  at  seventeen. 

The  city  of  Lyons  continues  to  be  divided  into  six  municipal  arrondisse- 
ments.  The  mayor  specially  delegates  two  of  his  adjuncts  to  each  of  the 
arrondissements.  They  are  charged  with  keeping  the  civil  registers  (regis- 
tres  de  I'etat  civile)  and  with  the  other  duties  fixed  by  the  regulation  of  the 
public  administration  of  June  11,  1881,  made  in  execution  of  the  law  of 
April  21,  1881. 

ART.  74.  The  functions  of  the  mayors,  adjuncts,  and  municipal  council- 
ors are  performed  gratuitously.  They  are  entitled  only  to  reimbursement  for 
the  expenses  which  the  execution  of  special  mandates  (mandate  speciaux) 
makes  necessary.  The  municipal  councils  may  vote  to  reimburse  the 
31 


482  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

mayor  for  the  expenses  of  representation  out  of  the  ordinary  resources  of 
the  commune. 

ART.  76.  The  municipal  council  elects  the  mayor  and  the  adjuncts  from 
among  its  own  members,  by  secret  ballot  and  by  absolute  majority. 

If,  after  two  ballots,  no  candidate  has  obtained  an  absolute  majority,  a 
third  ballot  is  taken  and  the  election  is  decided  by  relative  majority.  In 
.case  of  a  tie,  the  older  is  declared  elected. 

ART.  77.  The  meeting  in  which  an  election  for  mayor  is  held  is  presided 
over  by  the  oldest  member  of  the  municipal  council. 

For  every  election  of  a  mayor  or  adjuncts,  the  members  of  the  municipal 
council  are  convened  according  to  the  forms  and  delays  prescribed  by  Art. 
48;  the  order  of  convocation  contains  special  mention  of  the  election  which 
is  to  be  held. 

Before  this  convocation,  there  will  be  held  any  elections  which  may  be 
necessary  to  complete  the  municipal  council.  If,  after  the  complementary 
elections,  new  vacancies  occur,  the  municipal  council  will  proceed  never- 
theless to  the  election  of  the  mayor  and  the  adjuncts,  unless  it  is  reduced  to 
three-fourths  of  its  members.  In  that  case,  recourse  will  be  had  to  new 
complementary  elections.  They  will  be  held  in  the  course  of  one  month, 
dating  from  the  last  vacancy. 

ART.  78.  The  results  of  the  election  are  made  public  within  twenty-four 
hours,  by  means  of  a  placard  on  the  door  of  the  mayoralty-house.  They 
are,  within  the  same  length  of  time,  reported  to  the  sub-prefect. 

The  agents  and  employees  of  the  financial  administrations,  paymasters 
general,  special  receivers,  and  collectors,  agents  of  the  forests,  those  of  the 
post  and  telegraph,  and  the  guards  of  public  and  private  (particulier)  es- 
tablishments, cannot  be  mayors  or  adjuncts  or  perform  their  functions  even 
temporarily. 

The  salaried  agents  of  the  mayor  cannot  be  adjuncts. 

AKT.  81.  The  mayor  and  adjuncts  are  elected  for  the  same  term  as  the 
municipal  council. 

They  continue  in  the  performance  of  their  functions,  except  as  provided 
by  Arts.  80,  86,  and  87  of  the  present  law,  until  the  installation  of  their 
successors. 

However,  in  the  case  of  entire  renewal,  the  functions  of  the  mayor 
and  adjuncts  are,  from  the  installation  of  the  new  council  until  the  election 
of  the  mayor,  performed  by  the  municipal  councilors  in  the  order  of  the  list. 

ART.  82.  The  mayor  alone  is  charged  with  administration ;  but  he  may, 
under  his  supervision  and  responsibility,  delegate  by  order  a  part  of  his 
functions  to  one  or  more  of  his  adjuncts,  and  in  the  absence  of  the  adjuncts 
or  in  case  they  are  prevented,  to  members  of  the  municipal  council. 

These  delegations  remain  in  force  until  they  are  revoked. 

ART.  83.  In  case  the  interests  of  the  mayor  are  found  to  be  in  opposition 
to  those  of  the  commune,  the  municipal  council  designates  another  of  its 
members  to  represent  the  commune  either  in  courts  of  law  or  in  contracts. 

ART.  84.  In  case  of  absence,  suspension,  removal  or  any  other  hindrance, 


APPENDIX  III.— THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE        483 

the  mayor  is  provisionally  replaced,  in  all  his  functions,  by  an  adjunct,  in 
the  order  of  appointment ;  and  in  default  of  adjuncts,  by  a  municipal  coun- 
cilor, designated  by  the  council  or  else  taken  in  the  order  of  the  list. 

ART.  85.  In  case  the  mayor  refuses  or  neglects  to  perform  any  of  the  acts 
which  are  prescribed  for  him  by  law,  the  prefect  may,  after  having  de- 
manded it  of  him,  proceed  to  the  duty  in  person,  or  by  a  special  deputy. 

ART.  86.  Mayors  and  adjuncts  may  be  suspended  by  order  of  the  pre- 
fect for  a  time  which  shall  not  exceed  one  month,  and  which  may  be  ex- 
tended to  three  months  by  the  Minister  of  the  Interior. 

They  cannot  be  removed  except  by  order  of  the  President  of  the  Republic. 

Removal  involves,  by  virtue  of  law,  ineligibility  to  the  functions  of 
mayor  and  those  of  adjuncts,  during  one  year  from  the  date  of  the  order  of 
removal,  unless  a  general  renewal  of  the  municipal  council  takes  place  in 
the  mean  time. 

ART.  87.  In  the  case  provided  for  and  regulated  by  Art.  44,  the  president 
and,  in  his  default,  the  vice-president  of  the  special  delegation  performs  the 
functions  of  the  mayor. 

His  powers  come  to  an  end  at  the  installation  of  a  new  council. 

ART.  88.  The  mayor  appoints  to  all  the  communal  offices  (emplois)  for 
which  the  laws,  decrees,  orders  and  ordinances  in  force  at  the  time  do  not 
fix  a  special  law  of  appointment. 

He  suspends  and  dismisses  the  incumbents  of  these  offices. 

He  may  cause  the  agents  appointed  by  him  to  be  sworn  and  commis- 
sioned, but  on  condition  that  they  are  approved  by  the  prefect  or  sub-prefect. 

ART.  89.  When  the  mayor  proceeds  to  a  public  adjudication  on  account  of 
the  commune,  he  is  assisted  by  two  members  of  the  municipal  council  de- 
signated in  advance  by  the  council,  or,  in  default  of  this  designation,  named 
in  the  order  of  the  list. 

ART.  90.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  mayor,  under  the  control  of  the  municipal 
council  and  the  supervision  of  the  superior  administration : 

(1)  To  preserve  and  administer  the  property  of  the  commune,  and  to  per- 
form, in  consequence,  all  acts  conservative  of  its  rights ; 

(2)  To  manage  the  revenues,  to  supervise  the  communal  establishments 
and  the  communal  accounts ; 

(3)  To  prepare  and  propose  the  budget  and  order  the  payment  of  ex- 
penses ; 

(4)  To  direct  the  communal  works  ; 

(5)  To  make  provision  for  measures  relating  to  the  municipal  highways ; 

(6)  To  sign  agreements,  to  make  leases  of  property  and  contracts  for  com- 
munal work,  in  the  manner  established  by  the  laws  and  regulations  and  by 
Arts.  68  and  69  of  this  law. 

(7)  To  make  in  the  same  manner,  deeds  of  sale,  exchange,  partition,  ac- 
ceptance of  gifts  or  legacies,  acquisition,  or  bargain,  when  these  acts  have 
been  authorized  in  conformity  with  this  law ; 

(8)  To  represent  the  commune  in  courts  of  law,  either  as  plaintiff  or  as 
defendant ; 


484  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

And,  in  general,  to  execute  the  will  of  the  municipal  council. 

ART.  91.  The  mayor  is  charged,  under  the  supervision  of  the  superior  ad- 
ministration, with  municipal  and  rural  police  authority,  and  the  execution 
of  orders  of  the  superior  authority  relative  thereto. 

ART.  92.  The  mayor  is  charged,  under  the  authority  of  the  superior  admin- 
istration : 

(1)  With  the  publication  and  execution  of  the  laws  and  regulations; 

(2)  With  the  execution  of  measures  of  general  safety ; 

(3)  With  the  special  functions  which  are  assigned  to  him  by  law. 
ART.  94.  The  mayor  issues  orders  for  the  purpose  : 

(1)  Of  ordering  local  measures  on  the  matters  entrusted  by  law  to  his 
vigilance  and  his  authority ; 

(2)  Of  publishing  the  laws  and  police  regulations  and  calling  the  attention 
of  the  citizens  thereto. 

ART.  95.  The  orders  issued  by  the  mayor  are  dispatched  immediately  to 
the  sub-prefect,  or,  in  the  arrondissement  of  the  chief  town  of  the  depart- 
ment, to  the  prefect. 

The  prefect  may  annul  them  or  suspend  their  execution. 

Those  orders  which  contain  permanent  regulations  do  not  take  effect  until 
one  month  after  the  sending  back  of  the  duplicate  authenticated  by  receipts 
given  by  the  sub-prefect  or  the  prefect. 

Nevertheless,  in  case  of  urgency,  the  prefect  may  authorize  immediate 
execution. 

ART.  97.  The  municipal  police  authority  has  for  its  object  the  public 
order,  safety  and  health. 

It  includes  especially : 

(1)  Whatever  concerns  the  safety  and  convenience  of  passage  on  the  pub- 
lic streets,  wharves,  places  and  ways,  which  includes  cleaning,  clearing, 
the  removal  of  obstructions,  the  destruction  or  repair  of  dangerous  build- 
ings, prohibiting  the  exposure  of  anything  on  window-sills,  or  other  parts  of 
buildings  which  might  cause  any  injury  by  falling,  or  the  throwing  of  any- 
thing which  might  injure  passers-by,  or  cause  noxious  exhalations ; 

(2)  The  duty  of  suppressing  violations  of  public  quiet,  such  as  quarrels 
and  disputes  accompanied  by  disorder  in  the  streets,  tumults  in  places  of 
public  assembly,  mobs,  nocturnal  disturbances  and  gatherings  which  dis- 
turb the  sleep  of  the  people,  and  all  acts  of  a  nature  prejudicial  to  the  pub- 
lic tranquillity ; 

(3)  The  maintenance  of  order  in  places  where  there  are  great  assemblages 
of  people,  such  as  the  fairs,  markets,  public  rejoicings  and  ceremonies,  spec- 
tacles, plays,  cafe's,  churches  and  other  public  places ; 

(4)  The  mode  of  conveyance  of  dead  persons,  burials  and  exhumations, 
the  maintenance  of  order  and  decency  in  the  cemeteries ;  but  it  is  permis- 
sible to  make  distinctions  or  particular  rules  by  reason  of  the  belief  or  the 
religion  of  the  deceased  or  the  circumstances  which  accompanied  his  death ; 

(5)  Inspection  as  to  honesty  in  the  sale  of  goods  sold  by  weight  or  mea- 
sure, and  as  to  the  wholesomeness  of  eatables  exposed  for  sale ; 


APPENDIX  IIL—  THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE        485 

(6)  The  duty  of  preventing,  by  suitable  precautions,  and  of  stopping,  by 
the  distribution  of  necessary  assistance,  accidents  and  calamities,  such  as 
fires,  floods,  epidemic  or  contagious  diseases  and  distempers,  if  necessary 
calling  for  the  intervention  of  the  superior  administration; 

(7)  The  duty  of  provisionally  taking  any  necessary  measures  against  lu- 
natics whose  condition  might  compromise  the  public  morality,  the  security 
of  persons  or  the  preservation  of  property ; 

(8)  The  duty  of  preventing  or  remedying  untoward  occurrences  which 
might  be  occasioned  by  the  straying  of  harmful  or  ferocious  animals. 

ART.  98.  The  mayor  has  police  authority  over  the  national  and  depart- 
mental routes,  and  over  the  interior  ways  of  communication,  but  only  in 
matters  concerning  traffic  in  the  said  ways. 

He  may,  on  the  payment  of  fees  fixed  by  a  tariff  duly  established,  subject 
to  the  reservations  stated  in  Art.  7  of  the  law  of  11  frimaire  an  VII,  give 
permits  for  stands  or  temporary  stations  on  the  public  ways,  on  the  rivers, 
ports  and  wharves,  and  in  other  public  places. 

Individual  alignments,  building  permits,  and  other  street  permissions  are 
given  by  the  competent  authority  after  the  mayor  has  given  his  advice, 
whenever  he  is  not  competent  to  give  them  himself. 

Privileges  in  the  public  streets  by  precarious  title  or  essentially  revocable, 
the  granting  of  which  is  included  in  the  powers  of  the  mayor,  and  having 
for  their  object  especially  the  laying  in  public  soil  of  pipes  for  the  passage 
or  conveyance  either  of  water  or  of  gas,  may,  in  case  of  a  refusal  of  the 
mayor  not  justified  by  the  general  interest,  be  accorded  by  the  prefect. 

ART.  99.  The  powers  which  pertain  to  the  mayor,  in  virtue  of  Art.  91, 
are  no  hindrance  to  the  right  of  the  prefect  to  take,  for  all  of  the  com- 
munes of  the  department  or  any  of  them,  and  in  all  cases  in  which  they 
have  not  been  provided  for  by  the  municipal  authorities,  all  measures  rela- 
tive to  the  maintenance  of  the  public  health,  safety  and  tranquillity. 

This  right  cannot  be  exercised  by  the  prefect  with  respect  to  any  com- 
mune until  after  a  demand  in  due  form  of  law  to  the  mayor  proves  of  no  avail. 

ART.  103.  In  cities  having  more  than  40,000  inhabitants  the  organization 
of  the  body  charged  with  police  service  is  regulated  by  a  decree  of  the  Pres- 
ident of  the  Republic,  upon  the  advice  of  the  municipal  council. 

If  a  municipal  council  should  not  allow  the  funds  necessary  for  the  ex- 
pense or  should  allow  only  an  insufficient  sum,  the  grant  necessary  will  be 
entered  on  the  budget  by  a  decree  of  the  President  of  the  Republic,  the 
council  of  state  consenting. 

In  all  communes,  the  inspectors  of  police,  the  brigadiers,  under-brigadiers, 
and  the  police  officers  named  by  the  mayor  must  be  approved  by  the  sub- 
prefect  or  the  prefect.  They  may  be  suspended  by  the  mayor,  but  the  pre- 
fect alone  may  remove  them. 

ART.  106.  The  communes  are  civilly  responsible  for  injury  and  damage 
resulting  from  crimes  or  offenses  committed  by  open  force  or  violence  in 
their  territory  by  mobs  or  assemblies,  armed  or  unarmed,  whether  to  per- 
sons or  to  public  or  private  property. 
31* 


4.86  MUNICIPAL  GOVEENMENT  IN  EUEOPE 

The  damages  for  which  the  commune  is  responsible  are  apportioned 
among  the  inhabitants  resident  in  the  said  commune  by  means  of  a  special 
list,  including  the  lists  of  the  four  direct  taxes. 

ART.  107.  If  the  mobs  or  armed  assemblies  were  composed  of  the  inhabit- 
ants of  more  than  one  commune,  each  one  is  responsible  for  the  injury  and 
damage  caused,  in  the  proportion  fixed  by  the  tribunals. 

ART.  108.  The  provisions  of  Articles  106  and  107  are  not  applicable  : 

(1)  When  the  commune  is  able  to  prove  that  all  measures  in  its  power 
were  taken  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  the  mobs  or  assemblies,  and  of 
ascertaining  the  perpetrators ; 

(2)  In  communes  where  the  municipality  has  not  the  disposition  of  the 
local  police  or  the  armed  force ; 

(3)  When  the  damages  caused  are  the  result  of  an  act  of  war. 

ART.  109.  The  commune  declared  responsible  may  exercise  its  recourse 
against  the  perpetrators  of  the  disorder  and  their  accomplices. 

TITLE  IV.— THE  ADMINISTKATION  OF  THE  COMMUNES. 

CHAPTER  I.  —  THE  COMMUNAL  PROPERTY,  WORKS  AND  ESTABLISHMENTS. 

ART.  110.  The  sale  of  the  movable  and  immovable  property  of  the  com- 
munes other  than  that  which  is  in  public  use  may  be  authorized  on  the  de- 
mand of  any  creditor,  having  a  writ  of  execution,  by  a  decree  of  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Republic,  which  fixes  the  manner  of  sale. 

ART  116.  Two  or  more  municipal  councils,  by  the  mediation  of  their 
presidents,  and  after  having  notified  the  prefects,  may  make  an  agreement 
between  themselves  on  matters  of  communal  utility  comprised  within  their 
powers  and  which  interest  at  the  same  time  their  respective  communes. 

They  may  agree  to  undertake  or  maintain  at  common  expense  works  or 
institutions  of  common  utility. 

ART.  117.  Questions  of  common  interest  are  debated  in  a  conference  in 
which  each  municipal  council  is  represented  by  a  special  commission 
elected  for  this  purpose  and  composed  of  three  members  elected  by  secret 
ballot.  The  prefects  and  sub-prefects  of  the  departments  and  arrondisse- 
ments  in  which  the  interested  communes  are  situated  may  always  take 
part  in  these  conferences.  The  decisions  which  are  there  reached  take 
effect  only  after  they  have  been  ratified  by  all  the  municipal  councils  inter- 
ested, and  subject  to  the  reservations  stated  in  Chapter  3  of  Title  IV.  of 
this  law. 

CHAPTER  II.— JUDICIAL  ACTIONS. 

ART.  121.  No  commune  or  part  of  a  commune  may  appear  in  court  to  sue 
without  being  authorized  by  the  council  of  the  prefecture,  except  in  the 
cases  provided  for  by  Articles  122  and  154  of  this  law. 

After  a  judgment  is  given  the  commune  cannot  sue  before  another  degree 
of  jurisdiction  except  by  virtue  of  a  new  authorization  by  the  council  of  the 
prefecture. 


APPENDIX  III.— THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE         487 

ART.  122.  The  mayor  may  always,  without  previous  authorization,  insti- 
tute or  defend  any  action  of  possession,  and  perform  all  conservatory  acts 
or  acts  interrupting  forfeitures. 

ART.  128.  When  a  section  of  a  commune  proposes  to  institute  or  defend 
a  judicial  action,  either  against  the  commune  of  which  it  is  a  part,  or 
against  another  section  of  the  same  commune,  a  distinct  syndical  commis- 
sion is  formed  for  the  section  and  for  each  of  the  sections  interested. 

ART.  129.  The  members  of  the  syndical  commission  are  chosen  from 
among  the  eligibles  of  the  commune  and  elected  by  the  voters  of  the  sec- 
tion who  live  within  it  and  by  those  persons  who,  not  being  on  the  electoral 
lists,  are  landed  proprietors  in  the  section. 

ART.  131.  The  section  which  has  obtained  a  judgment  against  the  com- 
mune or  another  section  is  not  liable  to  the  charges  or  taxes  imposed  for 
the  payment  of  the  resulting  costs  and  damages. 

The  same  is  true  of  any  party  suing  a  commune  or  section  of  a  commune. 

CHAPTER  III.  THE  COMMUNAL  BUDGET. 

SECTION  I. —  RECEIPTS  AND  EXPENDITURES. 

ART.  132.  The  communal  budget  is  divided  into  the  ordinary  budget  and 
the  extraordinary  budget. 
ART.  133.  The  receipts  of  the  ordinary  budget  consist  of : 

(1)  The  income  of  all  property  of  which  the  inhabitants  do  not  have  the 
enjoyment  in  kind  [common  pastures,  forests,  etc.]  ; 

(2)  Assessments  imposed  annually  upon  those  having  the  right  to  benefits 
which  they  receive  in  kind  ; 

(3)  The  proceeds  of  the  ordinary  and  special  centimes  assigned  to  the 
communes  by  the  fiscal  laws ; 

(4)  The  proceeds  of  the  portion  accorded  to  the  commune  out  of  certain 
of  the  taxes  and  dues  gathered  on  account  of  the  State ; 

(5)  The  proceeds  of  the  municipal  octrois  devoted  to  ordinary  expenses ; 

(6)  The  proceeds  of  license  fees  collected  from  halls,  fairs,  markets,  and 
abattoirs  according  to  tariffs  duly  established ; 

(7)  The  proceeds  from  permits  for  stands  and  locations  upon  the  public 
roads,  upon  the  rivers,  ports,  and  wharves,  and  in  other  public  places ; 

(8)  The  proceeds  of  the  communal  tolls,  the  weighing,  measuring  and 
gaging  fees,  the  highway  tolls  (droits  de  voirie),  and  other  legally  estab- 
lished fees : 

(9)  The  revenue  from  the  communal  lands  used  for  purposes  of  burial, 
and  of  the  part  of  the  price  of  concessions  in  the  cemeteries  accruing  to  the 
commune;  * 

(10)  The  proceeds  from  water  concessions,  concessions  for  the  removal 
of  mud  and  rubbish  from  the  public  roads,  and  other  authorized  concessions 
for  communal  services ; 

*Two  thirds  ;  the  remaining  one  third  IB  devoted  to  charity. 


488  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

(11)  The  receipts  for  copies  of  administrative  and  civil  acts ; 

(12)  The  portion  of  the  products  of  fines  imposed  by  the  police  courts 
(tribunaux  de police  correctionnelle  et  de  simple  police)  which  the  laws  assign 
to  the  communes ; 

(13)  The  proceeds  of  the  sweeping  tax  in  the  communes  of  France  and 
Algiers  in  which  it  is  established,  on  their  demand,  in  conformity  with  the 
provisions  of  the  law  of  March  26,  1873,  by  virtue  of  a  decree  issued  in  the 
form  of  regulations  of  public  administration ; 

(14)  And  in  general  the  proceeds  of  contributions,  taxes  and  fees  the  col- 
lection of  which  is  authorized  by  law  in  the  interest  of  the  communes,  and 
of  all  the  annual  and  permanent  resources,  in  Algiers  and  in  the  colonies, 
the  collection  of  which  is  authorized  by  the  laws  and  decrees. 

The  establishment  of  centimes  on  account  of  insufficiency  of  revenues  is 
authorized  by  order  of  the  prefect  when  required  for  obligatory  expenses. 
In  other  cases  it  is  approved  by  decree. 
ART.  134.  The  receipts  of  the  extraordinary  budget  consist  of: 

(1)  Extraordinary  contributions  duly  authorized  ; 

(2)  The  price  of  alienated  property ; 

(3)  Gifts  and  legacies; 

(4)  Payments  of  exigible  principal  and  recoverable  interest ; 

(5)  The  proceeds  from  the  extraordinary  cutting  of  wood  [from  public 
forests] ; 

(6)  The  proceeds  of  loans ; 

(7)  The  proceeds  of  taxes  or  additional  taxes  of  octroi  specially  devoted 
to  extraordinary  expenses  and  the  repayment  of  loans ; 

(8)  And  all  other  accidental  receipts. 

ART.  135.  The  expenditures  of  the  ordinary  budget  comprise  the  annual 
and  permanent  expenditures  of  communal  utility. 

The  expenses  of  the  extraordinary  budget  comprise  the  accidental  or 
temporary  expenditures  which  are  paid  from  the  receipts  enumerated  in 
Art.  134  or  from  the  surplus  of  the  ordinary  receipts. 

ART.  136.  The  following  expenditures  are  obligatory  upon  the  communes : 

(1)  The  maintenance  of  the  town  hall,  or,  if  the  commune  has  none,  the 
renting  of  a  house  or  hall  to  take  its  place  ; 

(2)  Office  expenses  and  the  expense  of  printing  for  the  service  of  the 
commune,  of  preservation  of  the  communal  archives  and  of  the  collection 
of  the  administrative  acts  of  the  department ;  the  expense  of  subscription 
to  the  Bulletin  des  communes*  and,  for  the  communes  which  are  the  chief 
towns  of  the  canton,  the  expense  of  subscription  to  and  preservation  of 
the  Bulletin  des  lois; 

(3)  The  expense  of  enumerating  the  population,  of  the  electoral  assem- 
blies which  are  held  in  the  communes  and  of  electoral  tickets ; 

(4)  The  expense  of  civil  registers  and  of  books  of  registry  (livrets  de 
famille),  and  that  part  of  the  decennial  table  of  civil  acts  (actes  de  V6tat 
civile)  which  is  at  the  expense  of  the  communes ; 

*  The  Bulletin  des  communes  is  no  longer  published,  tout  it  is  replaced  toy  the  Journal 
offlciel,  edition  des  communes. 


APPENDIX  HI.—  THE  FEENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE         489 

(5)  The  salary  of  the  municipal  receiver,  and  of  the  overseer-in-chief  of 
the  octroi ; 

(6)  The  salaries  and  other  expenses  of  the  municipal  and  rural  police  and 
of  the  keepers  of  the  forests  of  the  commune ; 

(7)  The  pensions  at  the  expense  of  the  commune,  when  they  have  been 
regularly  liquidated  and  approved ; 

(8)  The  expense  of  rent  and  repairs  of  the  apartments  of  the  justice  of 
the  peace,  as  well  as  that  of  the  purchase  and  maintenance  of  his  movables 
in  the  communes  which  are  the  chief  towns  of  the  cantons ; 

(9)  The  expense  of  public  instruction,  in  conformity  with  law; 

(10)  The  quota  of  the  expense  of  assisted  children  and  of  lunatics  as- 
signed to  the  commune  in  conformity  with  law ; 

(11)  Payment  for  the  lodgings  of  vicars,  curates,  and  other  ministers  of 
public  worship  salaried  by  the  State,  when  there  is  no  building  set  apart  for 
their  residence,  and  when  the  vestry  boards  or  other  managing  boards  of 
the  religious  bodies  are  not  able  themselves  to  provide  for  the  payment 
of  this  expense; 

(12)  Heavy  repairs  of  communal  buildings,  with  the  exception,  when  they 
are  dedicated  to  worship,  of  the  previous  application  of  revenues  and  re- 
sources which  may  be  expended  by  the  vestry  boards  for  these  repairs,  and 
subject  to  the  execution  of  special  laws  concerning  buildings  devoted  to 
military  service. 

If  there  is  disagreement  between  the  vestry-board  and  the  commune, 
when  the  financial  assistance  of  the  latter  is  asked  by  the  vestry-board 
in  the  cases  provided  for  in  paragraphs  11  and  12,  it  is  decided  by  decree 
upon  the  statements  of  the  ministers  of  the  interior  and  the  ministers  of 
worship ; 

(13)  The  closure  of  cemeteries,  their  maintenance  and  their  removal  in 
the  cases  determined  by  the  laws  and  regulations  of  public  administration  ;• 

(14)  The  expense  of  preparing  and  preserving  the  plans  of  laying  out  and 
leveling  streets ; 

(15)  The  expense  of  the  councils  of  prudTiommes,  for  the  communes; 
comprised  within  the  territory  of  their  jurisdiction,  in  proportion  to  the 
number  of  electors  registered  on  the  special  electoral  lists  at  their  election  ;• 
the  inconsiderable  expense  of  consulting  chambers  of  arts  and  manufac- 
tures for  the  communes  where  they  exist ; 

(16)  The  assessments  and  taxes  established  by  law  on  the  communal 
property  and  revenues ; 

(17)  The  payment  of  exigible  debts ; 

(18)  The  expenses  of  the  local  roads  (chemins  vicinaux),  within  the  limits 
fixed  by  law; 

(19)  In  the  colonies  governed  by  this  law,  the  salaries  of  the  secretary 
and  employees  of  the  mayoralty ;  the  taxes  assessed  on  the  communal  prop- 
erty ;  the  expenses  for  the  service  of  the  militia  which  are  not  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  treasury ; 

(20)  The  expenses  occasioned  by  the  application  of  Art.  85  of  this  law,  and 
in  general  all  the  expenses  assigned  to  the  communes  by  provision  of  law. 


490  MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 

ART.  137.  The  establishment  of  octroi  taxes  voted  by  the  municipal  coun- 
cil, and  the  regulations  relative  to  their  collection,  are  authorized  by  decree 
of  the  President  of  the  Republic  in  the  Council  of  State,  with  the  advice  of 
the  council  general  or  of  the  departmental  commission  in  the  interval  be- 
tween the  sessions. 

ART.  140.  The  various  taxes  due  from  the  inhabitants  or  proprietors  by 
virtue  of  laws  and  local  usages  are  levied  by  vote  of  the  municipal  council 
approved  by  the  prefect. 

These  taxes  are  collected  according  to  the  forms  established  for  the  col- 
lection of  public  taxes. 

ART.  141.  Municipal  councils  may  vote,  within  the  limit  of  the  maximum 
fixed  each  year  by  the  council-general,  extraordinary  contributions  not  ex- 
ceeding five  centimes  for  five  years,  to  apply  the  proceeds  to  extraordinary 
expenses  of  communal  utility. 

They  may  also  vote  three  centimes  extraordinaires  to  be  applied  exclusively 
to  the  ordinary  local  roads  (chemins  vicinaux),  and  three  centimes  extraordi- 
naires to  be  applied  exclusively  to  recognized  country  roads  (chemins 
ruraux). 

They  vote  and  regulate  the  communal  loans  payable  from  the  centimes  ex- 
traordinaires voted  as  provided  in  the  first  paragraph  of  this  article,  or  from 
the  ordinary  resources,  when  the  liquidation,  in  this  latter  case,  is  within 
thirty  years. 

ART.  142.  The  municipal  councils  vote,  subject  to  the  approval  of  the 
prefect : 

(1)  Extraordinary  contributions  which  exceed  five  centimes,  without  ex- 
ceeding the  maximum  fixed  by  the  council-general,  the  duration  of  which, 
exceeding  five  years,  is  not  more  than  thirty  years ; 

(2)  Loans  payable  from  the  same  extraordinary  contributions  or  from 
the  ordinary  revenues  in  a  period  exceeding,  in  this  latter  case,  thirty  years. 

ART.  143.  Any  extraordinary  contribution  exceeding  the  maximum  fixed 
by  the  council-general,  and  any  loan  payable,  from  such  a  contribution,  is 
authorized  by  decree  of  the  President  of  the  Republic. 

If  the  contribution  is  established  for  a  period  of  more  than  thirty  years, 
or  if  the  loan  payable  from  extraordinary  resources  is  to  exceed  that  period, 
the  decree  is  made  in  the  Council  of  State. 

It  is  decided  by  a  law  if  the  amount  of  the  loan  exceeds  a  million  [francs], 
or  if,  added  to  the  amount  of  other  loans  not  yet  paid,  it  exceeds  a  million 
[francs]. 

ART.  144.  The  forests  and  woods  of  the  State  pay  the  ordinary  and  extra- 
ordinary centimes  additionels  devoted  to  the  expenses  of  the  communes  in 
.the  same  proportion  as  private  property. 

SECTION  II. —  VOTE  AND  REGULATION  OF  THE  BUDGET. 

ART.  145.  The  budget  of  each  commune  is  proposed  by  the  mayor,  voted 
"by  Jthe  municipal  council,  and  approved  by  the  prefect. 


APPENDIX  III.— THE  FRENCH  MUNICIPAL  CODE         491 

When  it  provides  for  all  the  necessary  expenses,  when  no  extraordinary 
receipts  are  applied  to  the  expenditures  either  obligatory  or  optional,  ordi- 
nary or  extraordinary,  the  allowances  contained  in  the  said  budget  for  op- 
tional expenditures  cannot  be  modified  by  the  superior  authority. 

The  budget  of  a  city  whose  revenues  are  at  least  three  million  francs  is 
always  submitted  to  the  approval  of  the  President  of  the  Eepublic,  on  the 
proposition  of  the  Minister  of  the  Interior. 

ART.  146.  The  credits  which  are  recognized  as  necessary  after  the  authen- 
tication of  the  budget  are  voted  and  authorized  in  conformity  with  the  pre- 
ceding article. 

ART.  147.  The  municipal  councils  may  insert  in  the  budget  a  sum  for 
unforeseen  expenses. 

The  sum  allowed  for  this  purpose  cannot  be  reduced  or  rejected  except- 
ing so  far  as  the  ordinary  revenues,  after  having  satisfied  all  the  obligatory 
expenditures,  will  not  permit  it  to  be  met. 

ART.  148.  The  decree  of  the  President  of  the  Republic  or  the  order  of  the 
prefect  which  approves  the  budget  of  the  commune  may  reject  or  reduce 
the  expenditures  allowed  therein,  except  in  the  cases  provided  for  by 
section  2  of  Art.  145  and  section  2  of  Art.  147  ;  but  it  cannot  increase  them 
or  introduce  new  expenditures  except  so  far  as  they  are  obligatory. 

CHAPTER  IV. —  THE  ACCOUNTABILITY  OF  THE  COMMUNE. 

ART.  152.  The  mayor  alone  may  issue  warrants. 

If  he  refuses  to  order  the  payment  of  an  expenditure  regularly  authorized, 
it  will  be  ordered  by  the  prefect  in  the  council  of  the  prefecture,  and  the 
order  of  the  prefect  will  take  the  place  of  the  warrant  of  the  mayor. 

ART.  157.  The  accounts  of  the  municipal  receiver  are  audited  by  the  coun- 
cil of  the  prefecture  subject  to  the  appeal  to  Court  of  Accounts,  for  the 
communes  whose  ordinary  revenues,  in  the  last  three  years,  do  not  exceed 
thirty  thousand  francs. 

They  are  audited  and  finally  approved  by  the  Court  of  Accounts  for  the 
communes  whose  revenue  is  greater. 

These  distinctions  are  applicable  to  the  accounts  of  the  treasurers  of  hos- 
pitals and  other  benevolent  establishments. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Abattoirs,  municipal,  of  Paris,  99, 100 ;  of 
Hanover,  300;  of  Munich,  342,  343,  363; 
of  Vienna,  431 ;  of  Berlin  and  of  other 
German  cities,  363,  366;  of  Hamburg, 
407 ;  of  Budapest,  456. 

Adjuncts  of  French  mayors,  173. 

Administration,  effective,  in  Germany, 
290,  291. 

Administrative  laws  of  Prussia,  305-307. 

Adulterations  of  food-supply,  Paris,  101. 

Aggrandizement  of  French  towns,  191. 

Agricultural  colonies,  municipal,  of 
Paris,  110;  on  Berlin  sewage  farms, 
340 ;  see  also  Labor  Colonies  of  German 
Cities,  368. 

Aix-la-Chapelle,  savings-banks,  372. 

Albany,  growth  of,  compared  with  Al- 
tona,  295. 

Alcalde  of  Spanish  towns,  245,  246. 

Alphand,  director  of  Parisian  works.  11, 
31. 

Altona,  growth  of,  compared  with  Al- 
bany and  Rochester,  295;  annexation 
of  suburbs,  302 ;  size  of  municipal  coun- 
cil, 310;  electric  lighting,  348;  gas  sup- 
ply, 348 ;  savings-banks,  372 ;  nitration 
of  water  supply,  394;  housing  condi- 
tions, 361 ;  cellar  residences,  403. 

Allegheny,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

American  cities,  growth  of,  compared 
with  German,  292-297. 

American  councils,  municipal,  size  of, 
compared  with  European,  310,  311. 

American  councilors  compared  with 
French,  180. 

American  county  government  and 
French  cantons,  152. 

American  mayors,  compared  with 
French,  175;  compared  with  German 
burgomasters,  314. 

American  street-paving  compared  with 
German,  298. 

American  water-supplies  and  filtration, 
392. 

Amiens,  once  walled,  now  boulevarded. 
198. 

Amsterdam,  death-rate,  233;  popula- 
tion, 234;  canals  and  sewers,  234;  gas 
plant,  235;  public  works,  235;  water- 
supply,  235. 

Annexations,  to  Paris  area,  65,  79-82 ;  to 
Milan,  261;  to  various  German  cities, 
301,  302;  to  Hamburg,  383;  to  Vienna, 
417 ;  to  Budapest,  442. 

Antwerp,  street  reforms,  227 ;  harbor  fa- 
cilities, 228;  population,  228;  death- 
rate,  230. 

Appointing  power,  in  hands  of  French 
mayors,  175 ;  in  Belgian  municipalities, 
226 ;  in  Dutch  towns,  239. 

Archeological  reservation  in  Borne,  279. 


Architecture,  administration  of,  at  Paris, 
133. 

Architecture,  public,  of  Bordeaux,  189; 
of  Budapest,  467;  of  Lille,  186;  of  Vi- 
enna, 422,  423. 

Area  of  Berlin,  301;  of  Bremen,  388;  of 
Budapest,  455 ;  of  Cologne,  301 ;  of  De- 
partment of  the  Seine,  82 ;  of  Frank- 
fort, 301 ;  of  Hamburg,  301,  383 ;  of  Han- 
over, 302 ;  of  Liibeck,  389 ;  of  Lyons,  189 ; 
of  Marseilles,  192 ;  of  Munich,  301 ;  of 
Paris,  80,  81,  82 ;  of  Vienna,  433. 

Arnhem,  population,  234. 

Arrondissements  of  France,  155,156;  of 
Paris,  16;  of  Paris  as  neighborhood 
centers,  32-35 ;  of  Paris  as  administra- 
tive units,  34. 

Artesian  wells  in  Milan,  264. 

Art,  industrial,  libraries  of  Paris,  127; 
museum  of  Lille,  186;  schools  in  French 
towns,  201. 

Arts,  fine,  promoted  by  Paris,  129-131. 

Asphalt  in  Paris  streets,  56-58;  in  Ber- 
lin, 298;  see  also  under  Paving  and 
Street  Systems. 

"  Assistance  publique  "  at  Paris,  102-110 ; 
in  French  towns,  201,  202. 

Asylums  and  hospitals  of  Paris,  105. 

Athens,  modernization  of,  xi. 

Augsburg,  public  pawn-shop,  372. 

Austrian  municipal  systems,  418. 

Avre  aqueduct,  Paris  waterworks,  67. 

Bacteriology,  municipal,  vi. ;  laborato- 
ries in  German  cities,  366;  and  Ham- 
burg water  supply,  396-400;  and  the  po- 
lice power,  406,  407. 

Bake-shops,  inspection,  Paris,  101. 

Balance-sheet  of  German  cities,  377. 

Ballot  system,  French  elections,  170, 171 ; 
in  Belgium,  223,  224. 

Baltimore,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Hamburg,  293. 

Barcelona,  progressive  character,  241 ; 
self  governing,  244 ;  population,  247, 248 ; 
death-rate,  247;  harbor,  public  works 
and  water  supply,  248. 

Barmen,  growth  of , compared  with  Amer- 
ican towns,  296 ;  gas  supply,  347 ;  elec- 
tric lighting,  348. 

Baths,  in  Paris  schools,  121;  public,  of 
Budapest,  458,  465,  466. 

Bavaria,  electoral  system,  308,  310. 

Beer-selling,  new  Hamburg  sanitary 
rules,  406. 

Belgium,  municipal  system  influenced 
by  French,  210;  medieval  conditions, 
210,  211 ;  in  period  of  French  Revolu- 
tion, 211,  212;  relations  with  Holland, 
212,  213 ;  constitution  of  1830.  214,  215 ; 
provinces,  how  administered,  215,  216 ; 
electoral  system,  216-224;  municipal 


495 


496 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


officials,  225;  municipal  system  com-" 
pared  with  French,  226 ;  towns  com- 
pared with  American,  226 ;  street  rail- 
ways, 228 ;  school  system,  231. 

Belgrade,  modernization  of,  xi. 

Belgrand,  constructor  of  Paris  sewers, 
etc.,  64, 70,  71. 

Berlin,  as  influenced  by  Paris,  1,  2 ;  com- 
pared with  Chicago,  292;  growth  of, 
compared  with  New  York,  Chicago, 
and  Philadelphia,293 ;  paving  of  streets, 
298 ;  area,  301 ;  railway  terminals,  303 ; 
navigation  of  Spree,  304 ;  electoral  sta- 
tistics of,  307,  303;  electoral  districts, 
309 ;  size  of  municipal  council,  310 ;  mu- 
nicipal council,  property  owners  in, 
312;  magistracy  of,  analyzed,  317;  po- 
lice and  watchmen,  321 ;  paving,  com- 
pared with  New  York,  332 ;  era  of  mu- 
nicipal progress,  333-335 ;  sewers  and 
sewage  farms,  336-340 ;  street  cleaning, 
345,  346 ;  gas  supply,  347 ;  electric  light- 
ing, 348;  street-railways,  351;  street- 
railway  franchises,  352;  housing  and 
inortality,356-360 ;  disinfection  stations, 
etc.,  362,  363 ;  municipal  abattoirs,  363, 
364;  market-halls,  364,  365;  poor-relief 
organization,  366-368;  lodging  houses, 
368;  savings-banks,  371;  municipal 
fire  insurance,  373;  parks  and  open 
spaces,  374 ;  nitration  of  water  supply, 
394 ;  cellar  residences,  403. 

Bern,  proportional  representation  in,  x. 

Bienfaisauce,  bureaux  de,  at  Paris,  103, 
104, 107 ;  in  French  communes,  202. 

Birth-rate  of  Amsterdam,  233 ;  of  Elber- 
feld,  194 ;  of  Frankfort-on-the-Main,  195 ; 
of  Paris  and  the  large  Frencli  towns, 
193-195 ;  of  the  Hague,  233 ;  of  Leeds, 
195;  of  Metz,  195;  of  Rotterdam,  233; 
of  Sheffield,  195;  of  Strassburg,  195;  of 
Stuttgart,  195. 

Bois  de  Boulogne  (Paris),  78. 

Bois  de  Vincennes  (Paris),  78. 

Bordeaux,  growth  and  population,  189; 
street-railways,  189 ;  births  and  deaths, 
194. 

Boston,  density  of  population,  84 ;  growth 
of,  compared  with  Hamburg,  293. 

Botanical  gardens  9f  Paris,  79. 

Boulevards  of  Amiens,  198 ;  of  Brussels, 
227;  of  Florence,  269;  of  Lille,  186;  of 
Marseilles,  192 ;  of  Rouen,  197 ;  pro- 
posed, in  Rome,  279;  see  also  Street 
Systems. 

Bread-supply  of  Paris  (health  inspec- 
tion), 101. 

Bremen,  annexation  of  suburbs,  302 ; 
street  cleaning,  346;  gas  supply,  347; 
savings-banks,  372 ;  as  a  free  city  and 
"  city-state,"  388 ;  area  and  population, 
388 ;  government  and  finance,  388,  389. 

Breslau,  density  of  population,  84; 
growth  of,  compared  with  Cincinnati. 
294 ;  size  of  municipal  council,  310 ;  paid 
and  unpaid  magistrates,  320 ;  as  a  well- 
governed  city,  341,  342;  water  supply 
and  sewage-farms,  342 ;  street  cleaning, 
345 ;  gas  supply,  347 ;  electric  lighting, 
348 ;  housing  conditions,  361 ;  parks  and 
open  spaces,  374. 

British  sanitary  progress  compared  with 
French,  191. 


British  towns,  little  influenced  by  conti- 
nent, 2;  compared  with  Italian,  249; 
size  of  municipal  council,  310;  see 
also  under  English,  etc. 

Briinn,  recent  development,  438 ;  number 
of  rooms  per  family,  454. 

Brunswick,  growth  of,  compared  with 
American  towns,  296;  progress  and 
characteristics,  343, 344 ;  gas  supply,  347. 

Brussels,  as  influenced  by  Paris,  1 ;  area, 
224,  225;  death-rate,  230;  population, 
224, 229 ;  municipal  elections,  224 ;  boule- 
vards and  street  reforms,  227 ;  munici- 
pal gas-plant,  228;  ship-canal,  228. 

Bucharest,  modernization  of,  xi. 

Budapest,  rise  of  a  new  metropolis.  See 
entire  chapter  ix,  435-468,  for  all  ques- 
tions affecting  Budapest;  as  influenced 
by  Paris,  1 ;  number  of  rooms  per  fam- 
ily, 454. 

Budget,  of  Berlin,  appendix;  of  Paris, 
143,  and  appendix ;  of  Rome  under  dif- 
ferent regimes,  272,  274. 

Buffalo,  growth  of,  compared  with  Co- 
logne, 294. 

Building  activity  in  Rome,  280,  281;  in 
German  cities,  302 ;  in  Vienna,  424-426. 

Building  reforms  at  Venice,  287,  288. 

Building  regulations,  of  Berlin,  357,  358; 
of  Budapest,  453 ;  of  Hamburg,  402-404 ; 
of  Paris,  90,92;  of  Rome,  281;  of  Vien- 
na, 425,  426. 

Burgomaster,  of  Budapest,  449 ;  of  Ham- 
burg, 385 ;  of  Vienna,  415,  416. 

Burgomaster,  German,  as  an  expert,  313 ; 
compared  with  American  mayor,  314 ; 
his  functions,  318 ;  salaries  in  Germany, 
320. 

Burgomasters,  Belgian,  225,  226 ;  Dutch, 
238,  239. 

Buttes-Chaumont  park  (Paris),  79. 

Cab  system  of  Paris,  87,  88. 

Cadiz,  constitution  of,  241,  242. 

Cantons  of  France,  151-154. 

Capitals,  provincial,  of  France,  186^-209. 

Capitoline,  seat  of  Rome's  municipal 
government,  251. 

Carnavalet  museum  of  Paris,  132. 

Cassel,  electric  lighting,  348. 

Cattle-markets,  municipal,  of  Budapest, 
456 ;  of  Paris,  100 ;  see  also  Abattoirs, 

Cellar  residences  in  Alton  a,  403 ;  in  Ber- 
lin, 360, 403 ;  in  Budapest,  453 ;  in  Ham- 
burg, 403 ;  in  Vienna,  453. 

Cemeteries,  municipal,  of  Paris,  95,  96 ; 
of  Stuttgart,  328. 

"  Centimes  additionnels"  in  France,  205, 
206. 

Centralization  in  French  local  govern- 
ment, 161-163. 

Cess-pools  of  Paris,  74. 

Champs  Elyse'es  (Paris),  79. 

Character  of  municipal  councilors.  See 
Councilors. 

Charity  administration,  in  Belgium,  231 ; 
in  Berlin  and  Germany,  366-370;  in 
France,  201,  202 ;  in  Holland,  240 ;  in 
Paris,  102-110;  in  Vienna,  433. 

Chemnitz,  growth  of,  compared  with  va- 
rious American  towns,  295 ;  annexation 
of  suburbs,  302 ;  size  of  municipal  coun- 
cil, 310;  electoral  period,  310;  house 


INDEX 


497 


owners  in  city  council,  312;  paid  and 
unpaid  magistrates,  320;  gas-supply, 
347 ;  parks  and  open  spaces,  374. 

Chicago,  density  of  population,  84 ;  com- 
pared with  Berlin,  292,  293 ;  compared 
with  Vienna,  410-412;  area  compared 
with  Hamburg's,  383. 

Children  (friendless)  of  Paris,  107,  108; 
municipal  duty  toward,  in  Germany, 
374,  375. 

Cholera,  and  city  government  in  Europe, 
378-380 ;  epidemic  at  Naples,  283 ;  at 
Hamburg,  341,  395-401;  at  Budapest, 
457 ;  immunity  of  Berlin,  363. 

Chnstiania,  growth,  population,  death- 
rate,  ix: 

Cincinnati,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Munich  and  Breslau,  294. 

Citizen  deputies  attached  to  Berlin  coun- 
cil, 313. 

Citizen  helpers  in  German  charity  work, 
366-368. 

City  Hall,  new,  of  Berlin,  333 ;  of  Ham- 
burg, 340 ;  of  Paris,  131 ;  of  Vienna,  422. 

City  life  and  the  national  welfare,  4. 

Civil-service,  organization  of,  in  Paris, 
27-32 ;  character  of,  in  Germany,  314. 

Cleansing  services  of  Berlin,  Dresden, 
and  various  German  cities,  344-346 ;  of 
Milan,  262  ;  of  Paris,  54-62;  of  Stuttgart, 
328. 

Cleveland,  growth  of,  compared  with  Co- 
logne, 294. 

Code,  municipal,  of  France,  163-185,  also 
translated  in  Appendix  III. ;  of  Italy, 
252-257. 

Collectivism  in  Germany,  291 ;  versus  so- 
cialism, 311,  312  ;  spirit  of,  325,  326. 

Cologne,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Cleveland,  Buffalo,  and  Pittsburg, 
294 ;  annexation  of  suburbs,  301 ;  size  of 
municipal  council,  310;  street  clean- 
ing, 345 ;  gas-supply,  347 ;  electric  light- 
ing, 348 ;  street  railway,  351 ;  street-rail- 
way franchises,  353;  parks  and  open 
spaces,  374. 

Columbus  (Ohio),  growth  of,  compared 
with  German  towns,  296. 

Commissary  of  police  in  Paris,  42-44. 

Committees  of  French  councils,  174, 175. 

Communes  of  France,  146-148, 165 ;  of  Bel- 
gium, 211,  216 ;  of  Spain,  244 ;  of  Italy, 
253. 

Compressed-air  pipes  (Paris)  in  sewers, 
75,  76. 

Compulsory  education  in  France,  119, 
200;  see  also  under  Education  and 
Schools. 

Compulsory  workingmen's  insurance  in 
Germany,  369,  370. 

Concentric  growth  of  Paris,  79-82. 

Conception,  German,  of  municipal  life, 
323. 

Concessions  in  Paris  streets  and  parks,76. 

Conduits,  Paris,  76. 

Congestion  of  medieval  towns,  2  ;  of  Ly- 
ons, 190 ;  of  Toulouse,  196 ;  relieved  in 
Berlin,  359;  of  the  old  Vienna,  419. 

Constantinople  coming  under  influence 
of  Paris,  2  ;  of  Budapest,  468. 

Contract  system  in  Paris  paving,  58. 

Copenhagen,  growth,  population,  and  de- 
cline of  death-rate,  viii. 
32 


Councils-general  in  France,  148 ;  of  De- 
partment of  the  Seine,  82. 

Council,  municipal,  of  Belgian  towns, 
216 ;  of  Berlin  and  German  towns,  SOS- 
SIS;  (biirgerschaft)  of  Bremen,  388;  of 
Budapest,  448;  of  Dutch  towns,  238; 
(biirgerschaft)  of  Hamburg,  384;  of 
Italian  towns,  253-255 ;  (biirgerschaft) 
of  Liibeck,  388 ;  of  Paris,  16  et  seq.  ;  of 
Spanish  towns,  245, 246 ;  of  Vienna,  414- 
416. 

Councils,  municipal,  as  central  fact  in 
French  municipal  government,  165 ;  as 
central  fact  in  German  city  govern- 
ment, 308,  309 ;  election  of,  in  Belgian 
towns,  222-224 ;  election  of,  in  French 
towns,  166-172 ;  size  of,  in  various  Ger- 
man and  European  cities,  310,  311. 

Councilors,  character  of,  in  Belgian 
towns,  225;  in  Dutch  towns,  238;  in 
France,  180 ;  in  Germany,  311 ;  in  Italy, 
266  ;  in  Milan,  265,  266 ;  in  Paris,  20,  21 ; 
in  Vienna,  415. 

Councilors,  French,  compared  with  Eng- 
lish, German  and  American,  180. 

County  government,  English,  and  French 
departments,  164, 165. 

Cracow,  recent  development,  438 ;  num- 
ber of  rooms  per  family,  454. 

Crfcches,  aided  by  Paris  municipality,  110. 

Crefeld,  growth  of,  compared  with  Amer- 
ican towns,  296. 

Crematory  (municipal)  of  Paris,  96. 

Crispi  and  sanitary  laws  of  Italy,  257. 

Cuxhaven,  belongs  to  Hamburg,  383. 

Dantzic,  modern  remaking  of,  344 ;  gas 
supply,  347. 

Danube,  improvements  at  Vienna,  429, 
430;  improvements  and  commerce  at 
Budapest,  440. 

Darmstadt,  electric  lighting,  348. 

Deak,  Francis,  and  Hungarian  policy,  437. 

Death-rate  of  Amsterdam,  233 ;  of  Ant- 
werp, 230;  of  Brussels,  230;  of  Budapest, 
451,  452 ;  of  Elberfeld,  194  ;  of  Frank- 
fort-on-the-Main,  195;  of  large  French 
towns,  193-195;  of  the  Hague,  233;  of 
Hamburg,  409;  of  Holland,  233;  of 
Leeds,  195 ;  of  Marseilles,  192,  193 ;  of 
Metz,  195;  of  Milan,  265;  of  Naples, 
285,  286 ;  of  Paris,  102,  193 ;  of  Rome, 
276;  of  Rotterdam,  233;  of  Sheffield, 
195;  of  Spanish  towns,  247;  of  Strass- 
burg,  195 ;  of  Stuttgart,  195 ;  of  Turin, 
269  ;  of  Vienna,  430-432. 

Death-rate  of  Berlin  as  affected  by  hous- 
ing, etc.,  356-360. 

Death-rate  of  infants,  194, 195. 

Debt,  municipal,  of  Paris,  134-140;  of 
French  towns,  208,  209 ;  of  German 
towns,  376,  377  :  of  Hamburg,  389. 

Defenses  of  Paris,  82,  83. 

Demolitions  in  Paris,  8-12. 

Density  of  population,  in  Paris,  London, 
New  York,  Brooklyn,  Chicago,  Boston, 
and  Philadelphia,  83,  84;  in  Holland, 
232  ;  in  French  towns,  187. 

Density  and  transit  in  Paris,  84. 

Department  of  the  Seine,  82. 

Departments  of  France,  147 ;  reform  laws 
of  1871,  162-165 ;  compared  with  Eng- 
lish counties,  164, 165. 


498 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


Departments,  administrative,  of  Ham- 
burg, 386,  387. 

Detroit,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Magdeburg,  294. 

Dhuis  aqueduct,  Paris  waterworks,  66. 

Directories,  city,  made  by  police  officials 
in  Germany,  321. 

Directory,  of  France,  administrative 
laws  of  1795, 150^54. 

Disinfection  service  of  Paris,  94,  95 ;  of 
Milan,  264 ;  of  Berlin,  362  ;  of  Hamburg, 
404,  405. 

Docks,  of  Hamburg,  304 ;  see  Harbor  fa- 
cilities. 

Dortmund,  growth  of,  compared  with 
American  towns,  296. 

Drainage.    See  Sewers. 

Drawing  in  Paris  schools,  125. 

Dresden,  as  influenced  by  Paris.  1,  2; 
growth  of,  compared  with  New  Or- 
leans, 294 ;  annexation  of  suburbs,  301 ; 
river  improvement,  304 ;  size  of  mu- 
nicipal council,  310 ;  electoral  periods, 
310 ;  house  owners  in  city  council,  312 ; 
paid  and  unpaid  magistrates,  320; 
street  cleaning,  345,  346 ;  gas  supply, 
347 ;  electric  lighting,  348 ;  street  rail- 
ways, 351 ;  housing  conditions,  361 ;  pro- 
visions against  epidemics,  363 ;  savings- 
banks,  371 ;  parks  and  open  spaces,  374. 

Dunbar,  Professor,  and  Hamburg  sani- 
tation, 398-400. 

Duisburg,  electric  lighting,  348. 

Diisseldorf,  growth  of,  compared  with 
various  American  towns,  295 ;  house 
owners  in  city  council,  312 ;  street  clean- 
ing, 346;  gas  supply,  347 ;  electric  light- 
ing, 348. 

Dutch  municipal  system  influenced  by 
French,  210. 

Dutch  burgomasters,  238,  239. 

Dutch  school  system,  240. 

Echevins,  Belgian,  225. 

Education,  iu  Holland,  240;  in  German 
cities,  374,  375 ;  in  Milan,  265 ;  and  the 
community  in  Germany,  330 ;  qualifica- 
tions for  suffrage  in  Belgium,  217-222 ; 
recognized  in  Austrian  electorate,  413 ; 
recognized  in  Hungarian  electorate, 
450. 

Educational  system  of  Belgium,  231 ;  of 
Budapest,  462 ;  of  France,  199-201 ;  of 
Lille,  187  ;  of  Paris,  118-126. 

Educational  system  of  Paris  as  feeder  of 
civil  service,  31. 

El  be  as  water  supply  of  Hamburg,  389-396. 

Elberfeld,  growth  of,  compared  with 
American  towns,  296;  births  and  deaths, 
194. 

Election  of  French  councils,  166-172. 

Elections,  municipal,  in  Milan,  266. 

Elective  franchise.    See  Suffrage. 

Electric  companies  chartered  in  Paris,  52. 

Electric  lighting  in  Paris,  50-54;  in  Mil- 
an, 262,  263;  m  Berlin,  348;  in  Ham- 
burg and  various  German  cities,  348, 
349 ;  in  Budapest,  459 

Electric  street  railways  in  Budapest, 
459;  in  Germany,  354,  355;  in  Milan, 
262,  263. 

Electrical  works,  municipal,  of  Stutt- 
gart, 323-326. 


Emergency  relief  at  Paris,  108, 109. 

Employment  bureaus,  free,  at  Paris,  111. 

English  birth-rates  and  death-rates,  194, 
195. 

English  council  committees  compared 
with  French,  175. 

English  councilors  compared  with 
French,  180. 

English  mayor  compared  with  French, 
175. 

English  municipal  system  compared 
with  French,  163, 164. 

English  municipal  executive,  compared 
with  German  and  French,  315-317. 

Epidemic  hospitals,  Paris,  95;  in  Ham- 
burg, 404,  405;  of  Budapest,  457;  in 
Venice,  287. 

Essen,  growth  of,  compared  with  Amer- 
ican towns,  296;  an  extreme  example 
of  three-class  voting  system  of  Ger- 
many, 308 ;  street  cleaning,  346. 

European  towns,  newness  of,  292. 

Examinations,  educational,  lor  suffrage, 
in  Belgium,  218-220. 

Exemption  of  new  buildings  from  taxa- 
tion in  Vienna,  424,  425. 

Expenditures  of  Paris,  140, 141. 

Fall  River,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

Fares,  street  railway,  in  Belgium,  230; 
in  France,  188;  in  Germany,  354;  in 
Vienna,  429. 

Farms,  sewage,  of  Paris,  72,  73. 

Filtration  of  water  at  Berlin,  335 ;  at 
Breslau,342;  at  Budapest,  457;  at  Ham- 
burg, 340,  341,  389-396;  at  Brunswick, 
343. 

Finances,  municipal,  of  Paris,  134-145;  of 
French  towns  supervised,  179;  of 
French  towns,  statistics,  204,  209;  of 
Genoa,  267 ;  of  housing  reforms  at  Na- 
ples, 285. 

Finance,  municipal,  in  Germany,  330, 331. 

Financial  burdens  of  European  cities, 
297. 

Fine-arts,  promoted  by  Paris  municipal- 
ity, 129-131. 

Florence,  modern  conditions  of,  269-271. 

Flushing  sewers  in  Paris,  75. 

Food  inspection  in  German  cities,  365, 
366 ;  in  Hamburg,  405 ;  in  Vienna,  431. 

Food-supply  and  inspection  in  Paris,  97- 
102. 

Forckenbeck,  Dr.,  as  mayor  of  Berlin 
and  Breslau,  318,  342. 

Forestry,  municipal,  in  Stuttgart,  328. 

Fountains,  public,  in  Rome,  276. 

Franchise,  elective.    See  Suffrage. 

Franchises,  electric,  in  Berlin,  349,  350. 

Franchise  (street)  questions  in  France, 
184. 

Franchises,  street-railway,  of  Berlin, 
Hamburg,  Frankfort,  and  other  Ger- 
man cities,  352-354. 

Frankfort-on-the-Main,  influenced  by 
Paris,  2 ;  births  and  deaths,  195 ;  growth 
of,  compared  with  Newark,  295;  size 
of  municipal  council,  310;  house  owners 
in  city  council,  312;  paid  and  unpaid 
magistrates,  320 ;  waterworks  and  sew- 
age purification,  343;  street  cleaning, 
345,  346;  gas  supply,  348;  street-rail- 


INDEX 


499 


way,  351 ;  street-railway  franchises, 
353 ;  parks  and  open  spaces,  374. 

Francis  Joseph  I.  and  Vienna  municipal- 
ity, 412. 

Free  cities  of  Hamburg,  Bremen,  and 
Liibeck,  384-389. 

French  services  to  civilization  compared 
with  German,  3. 

French  municipal  system.  See  chapter 
I.,  pp.  146-209,  and  appendix  III. ;  as  a 
type,  210. 

French  municipal  executive  compared 
with  German  and  English,  315-317. 

French  municipal  code  of  1884,  163-185, 
and  appendix  III. 

French  regime  in  Holland,  236. 

Fuel  supply  as  a  municipal  function,  327. 

Functions  of  Belgian  town  councils,  231; 
of  French  councils,  181 ;  9f  Italian  mu- 
nicipalities, 256;  municipal,  in  Ger- 
many, 323  et  seq. 

Funerals,  a  church  monopoly  in  Paris, 
96,  97. 

Gaffky,  Professor,  and  Hamburg  sanita- 
tion, 398. 

Garbage  removal  in  Paris,  61 ;  Stuttgart, 
328 ;  in  German  cities,  345, 346 ;  in  Ham- 
burg, 401,  402. 

Gas  supply  of  Budapest,  458 ;  of  German 
cities,  346-348 ;  of  Milan,  263 ;  of  Paris, 
45-51 ;  of  Stuttgart,  324,  325. 

Gas-works,  municipal,  of  Amsterdam, 
235 ;  of  Brussels,  228 ;  of  German  cities, 
346-348. 

Gas-works,  non-municipal,  in  German 
cities,  348. 

General  ticket,  proposed  for  Paris  elec- 
tions, 21 ;  in  French  elections,  166 ;  in 
Belgium,  222  ;  in  Italy,  255. 

Geneva,  proportional  representation,  x. 

Genoa,  municipal  affairs,  266,  267. 

Gennevilliers,  Paris  sewage  farm,  72. 

German  municipal  system.  See  chapters 
V.,  VI.,  VII. ;  like  English  and  French, 
in  making  council  the  basis  of  munici- 
pal government,  309. 

German,  English,  and  French  municipal 
executive  systems  compared,  315-317. 

German  services  to  civilization  compared 
with  French,  3. 

German  cities,  growth  compared  with 
American,  292,  297. 

German  councilors  compared  with 
French,  180. 

Gerrymandering  in  French  cities,  167. 

Giuntas  of  Italian  municipalities,  253-255. 

Glasgow,  as  key  to  study  of  British  mu- 
nicipal gov't,  vi. ;  water-supply,  68. 

Good  government  as  exemplified  in 
Hanover,  301. 

Good  roads  in  Germany,  298;  in  France, 
183r185. 

Gorlitz,  housing  conditions,  361. 

Governor,  civil,  of  Spanish  provinces,  245. 

"  Grand  Prix  "  of  Paris  municipality,  133. 

Gratz,  number  of  rooms  per  family,  454. 

Grimm,  Herman,  quoted  on  the  new 
Rome,  271. 

Gronengen,  population,  234. 

Ground-plans  of  modern  cities,  297. 

Gymnasium  in  Paris  schools,  125. 

Haarlem,  population  of,  234. 


Hague,  death-rate,  233;  population,  234; 
growth  of,  compared  with  American 
towns,  296. 

Hamburg,  administration  and  progress, 
chapter  VII. ;  influenced  by  Paris,  2 : 
water  nitration,  68 ;  growth  of,  compar- 
ed with  Boston  and  Baltimore,  293 ;  har- 
bor facilities,  303, 304 ;  water  supply  and 
drainage,  340,  341 ;  street  cleaning,  345, 
346 ;  gas  supply,  347 ;  electric  lighting, 
348 ;  street-railways,  351 ;  street-railway 
franchises,  353 ;  provisions  against  epi- 
demics, 363 ;  public  pawn-shops,  372 ; 
savings-banks,  371 ;  parks  and  open 
spaces,  374;  cholera  visitations,  380; 
commercial  character,  381 ;  street  sys- 
tem, 382 ;  as  a  city-state,  382 ;  area  and 
population,  383;  administrative  system, 
383  387 ;  public  debt,  389 ;  water  supply, 
389-396;  general  sanitary  conditions, 
401-409 ;  cellar  residences,  404. 

Hanover,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ko- 
nigsberg,  Louisville,  and  Jersey  City ; 
295 ;  its  modern  transformation  and 
appointments,  298-301;  annexation  of 
suburbs,  302 ;  house  owners  in  city 
council,  312  ;  paid  and  unpaid  magis- 
trates, 320;  gas  supply,  348 ;  street-rail- 
ways, 351. 

Hanseatic  League,  384. 

Harbor  facilities  of  Amsterdam,  235 ;  of 
Antwerp,  228;  of  Barcelona,  248;  of 
Dantzic,  344 ;  of  Genoa,  267 ;  of  Ham- 
burg, 304 ;  of  Le  Havre,  197 ;  of  Mar- 
seilles, 192. 

Harbor  sanitary  service  at  Hamburg, 
407,  408. 

Harmony  of  Paris  buildings,  90. 

Harrison,  Frederic,  on  Paris  before  Rev- 
olution, 13 ;  quoted  on  Italian  changes, 
271 ;  on  transformation  of  Rome,  272. 

Haussmann,  Baron,  street  reform  of 
Paris,  8-11;  financial  policy,  135. 

Havre,  births  and  deaths,  195;  popula- 
tion, 196, 198;  streets,  harbor,  and  pub- 
lic works,  196, 197  ;  municipal  revenues, 
207 ;  municipal  debt,  208. 

Health  boards  of  Paris,  92-94. 

Height  of  Paris  buildings,  90. 

Historic  edifices  protected  at  Rome,  282. 

Historical  researches,  municipal,  at 
Paris,  131-133. 

Holland,  union  with  Belgium,  212-213; 
growth  of  town  population,  231-234 ; 
health  conditions,  232-235 :  death  rate, 
233 ;  administrative  system  influenced 
by  French,  236-238. 

Home-rule,  municipal,  as  exemplifled  at 
Hamburg,  387. 

Hospitals  of  Paris,  95, 105 ;  of  Budapest, 
457.  For  epidemic  hospitals  see  Sani- 
tary, etc. 

Housekeeping,  municipal,  in  Germany, 
289. 

House  owners  in  German  city  councils, 
312 

Housing  conditions  of  Belgian  towns, 
229 ;  of  Budapest,  Vienna,  and  six  other 
chief  Austrian  towns,  453-455  ;  of  Ger- 
man cities,  355-362;  of  Hamburg,  402- 
404;  of  Lyons,  190;  of  Milan,  265;  of 
Naples,  251,  252, 283-285 ;  of  Paris,  79,  90- 
92 ;  of  Rome,  280-282 ;  of  Venice,  287. 


500 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUEOPE 


fie  de  la  Cite"  (Paris),  reconstructed,  9 ; 
original  site  of  Paris,  80. 

Illiteracy,  in  Belgium,  217;  disqualifies 
for  Italian  suffrage,  254. 

Improvements,  recent,  in  German  towns, 
333. 

Income,  of  Paris,  141,  and  appendix  I. ; 
of  Berlin,  appendix  II. 

Indebtedness.    See  Debts. 

Indianapolis,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

Industrial-art  libraries  of  Paris,  127. 

Infant  deaths  in  various  French,  English, 
and  German  towns,  194,  195. 

Initiative,  public  and  private,  291. 

Insurance,  mutual-benefit  societies  in 
Germany,  369,  370;  old-age,  etc.,  in  Ger- 
many, 369,  370 ;  municipal,  against  fire, 
in  Berlin,  373. 

Isolation  of  infectious  disease  in  Germa- 
ny, 362,  363. 

Italian  municipal  system  influenced  by 
French,  210. 

Italian  municipal  progress,  249-288. 

Italian  epidemics,  284. 

Italian  towns,  size  of  municipal  council, 
310. 

Jersey  City,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Hanover  and  Konigsberg,  295. 

Kansas  City,  growth  of,  compared  with 

various  German  towns,  295. 
Karlsruhe,  annexation  of  suburbs,  302. 
Kindergartens    (e"coles  maternelles)    of 

Paris,  119 ;  in  French  towns,  199. 
Kiosks  in  Paris  streets  and  parks,  77. 
Koch,  Dr.,  and  German  sanitation,  398. 
Konigsberg,  growth  of,  compared  w_ith 

Hanover,  Louisville,  and  Jersey  City, 

295;  gas  supply,  347;  electric  lighting, 

348. 
Korosi,  Joseph,  statistician  of  Budapest, 

452-455. 

Labor  colonies  of  German  cities,  368. 

Labor  exchange  of  Paris,  111. 

Laboratory,  chemical,  at  Hamburg,  407 ; 
floating,  at  Hamburg,  399;  municipal, 
of  Paris,  100, 101 ;  municipal,  of  Milan, 
264. 

Lacroix,  proposed  constitution  for 
Paris,  18. 

Laud  ownership,  municipal.in  Budapest, 
456 ;  in  southeastern  Europe,  456. 

Lavatories,  public,  of  Paris,  76. 

Lavelaye,  on  social  conditions  of  Belgian 
towns,  229. 

Leeds,  birth  and  deaths,  195. 

Leipsic,  growth  of,  compared  with  St. 
Louis  and  San  Francisco,  293,  294 ;  com- 
pared with  Cincinnati,  Breslau,  and 
Munich,  294;  annexation  of  suburbs, 
301;  rail  way  terminals,  303;  size  of  mu- 
nicipal council,  310;  house-owners  in 
city  council,  312 ;  paid  and  unpaid  mag- 
istrates, 320;  street  cleaning,  345 ;  street 
railways,  351 ;  parks  and  open  spaces, 
374 ;  gas  supply,  347 ;  electric  lighting, 
348 ;  housing  conditions,  362 ;  provisions 
against  epidemics,  363. 

Lemberg,  number  of  rooms  per  family, 
454. 


Leroy-Beaulieu  on  English  municipal 
system,  163. 

Library  centers  in  Parisian  mairies,  33. 

Libraries  of  Paris,  127-129;  of  Lille,  186; 
of  Hanover,  300. 

Liege,  street  improvements,  226,  227; 
population,  229. 

Lighting,  public,  of  Paris,  45-54 ;  of  Ger- 
man cities,  346-350 ;  see  also  Gas  Siip- 
ply  and  Electricity. 

Lille,  modern  transformation,  186,  187; 
births  and  deaths,  194;  and  Roubaix, 
197, 198 ;  technical  schools,  201 ;  munici- 
pal debt,  208 ;  municipal  revenues,  207. 

Liquor  question,  viii. 

Lisbon,  death-rate,  247. 

Loans  (outstandiug)  of  Paris,  136-140. 

Local  government  reorganized  in  Prus- 
sia, 306. 

Lodging-houses,  municipal,  of  Paris,  109, 
110 ;  of  Berlin,  368. 

London,  little  influenced  by  Continent,  2 ; 
sub-municipalities  and  Parisian  ar- 
rpndissements,  34;  density  of  popula- 
tion, 83;  transit  system,  85;  size  of 
municipal  council,  310;  filtration  of 
water  supply,  394. 

Louis  XIV.  and  Louis  XV.,  Paris  im- 
provements, 7. 

Louis  Philippe,  street  reforms  of  Paris,,  8. 

Louisville,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Hanover  and  Konigsberg,  295. 

Lowell,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ger- 
man towns,  296. 

Lubeck,  electric  lighting,  348;  govern- 
ment of,  388 ;  as  a  free  city  and  "  city- 
state,"  388. 

Luxemburg  gardens  (Paris),  79. 

Lyons,  restoration  of  mayoralty,  18;  can- 
tons of,  153 ;  police  system,  182 ;  street- 
railways,  188,  189;  area,  growth,  and 
population,  189;  street  system,  190; 
housing  conditions,  190;  water  and 
drainage,  191 ;  births  and  deaths,  193 ; 
municipal  revenues,  207;  municipal 
debt,  208. 

Macadamized  roads  of  Paris,  58;  of 
France,  185. 

Madrid,  population,  247 ;  death-rate,  247. 

Magdeburg,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Detroit  and  Milwaukee,  294 ;  annexa- 
tion of  suburbs,  302  ;  size  of  municipal 
council,  310;  gas  supply,  347;  housing 
conditions,  361. 

Magistracy,  municipal,  of  Berlin,  317; 
or  German  towns,  apportionment  of 
tasks,  319 ;  of  Hamburg,  385 ;  of  Vienna, 
416. 

Magistrates,  German,  as  administrative 
experts,  313,  314. 

Magistrates'  salaries  in  Germany,  320. 

Mairies  of  Paris  as  social  centers,  33. 

Malaga,  municipal  conditions,  248. 

Mannheim,  growth  of,  compared  with 
American  towns,  296. 

Manual  training  in  Paris  schools,  125. 

Markets  of  Paris,  98.  99;  of  Budapest, 
457. 

Markethalls.iuBerlin  and  German  cities, 
364-366. 

Marriage  performed  by  maires  in  Paris, 
33. 


INDEX 


501 


Marseilles,  cantons  of,  153;  street-rail- 
ways, 188;  health  conditions,  191-193; 
area  and  population,  192 ;  streets  and 
boulevards,  192 ;  harbor  facilities,  192 ; 
sewers,  192 ;  slums,  192 ;  birth-rate,  193 ; 
technical  schools,  201 ;  municipal  reve- 
nues, 207;  municipal  debt,  208. 

Maternal  schools,  of  Paris,  119 ;  of  other 
French  towns,  199. 

Mayoralty  questions  in  Paris,  17. 

Mayor.  See  also  Alcalde,  Burgomaster, 
Sindaco. 

Mayor,  American,  compared  with  French 
and  British,  175. 

Mayor  and  adjuncts  of  French  towns, 
173. 

Mayors,  French,  appointed  by  Napoleon, 
I.,  156;  have  appointing  power,  375;  in 
dual  capacity,  176-178 ;  control  police, 
181-183  ;  and  street  system,  183. 

Meals  served  in  Paris  schools,  122 ;  in 
schools  of  other  French  towns,  199. 

Medical  inspection  of  Paris  schools,  121. 

Medical  organization,  Paris  hospitals, 
105, 106. 

Medical  relief  services  In  Paris,  106. 

Medicine,  practice  of,  new  Hamburg 
rules,  408, 

Medieval  towns,  their  congestion,  2. 

Membership  (numerical)  of  councils  in 
German  and  various  cities,  310,  311. 

Merchants  govern  Hamburg,  385. 

Metropolitan  transit,  85. 

Metz,  births  and  deaths,  195;  electoral 
periods,  309,  310 ;  electric  lighting,  348. 

Milan's  municipal  system,  growth,  pop- 
ulation, and  progress,  258-266. 

Milk  supply,  of  Paris,  101 ;  of  Hamburg, 
new  regulations,  405,  406. 

Milwaukee,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Magdeburg,  294. 

Minneapolis,  growth  of,  compared  with 
various  German  towns,  295 ;  compared 
with  Budapest  as  grain  and  milling 
center,  439-441. 

Minneapolis  and  St.  Paul,  joint  area  com- 
pared with  Hamburg's,  383. 

Minority  representation,  not  provided  in 
France,  172 ;  in  Italy,  255 ;  in  Switzer- 
land, ix,  x. 

Monopoly  companies  of  Paris,  89. 

Monopoly  of  funerals  in  Paris,  96,  97. 

Monts-de-Pie'te',  in  Paris,  112-116;  in  other 
French  towns,  202, 203;  in  Belgium,  231. 

Montsouris  park  (Paris),  79. 

Munich,  influenced  by  Paris,  2 ;  growth 
of,  compared  with  Leipsic,  Breslau, 
and  Cincinnati,  294 ;  annexation  of 
suburbs,  301;  electoral  periods,  310; 
size  of  municipal  council,  310;  paid 
and  unpaid  magistrates,  320 ;  water  sup- 
ply and  sanitary  conditions,  342,343; 
street  cleaning,  345;  gas  supply,  347, 
348 ;  street-railway,  351 ;  housing  con- 
ditions, 362 ;  municipal  abattoirs,  363 ; 
provisions  against  epidemics,  363; 
parks  and  open  spaces,  374. 

Music  in  Paris  schools,  125. 

Mutual-benefit  insurance  societies  in 
Germany,  369,  370. 

Nantes,    population,   196;     births    and 
deaths,  195. 
32* 


Naples,  housing  conditions,  251, 252 ;  new 
sanitary  regime,  282-286;  effects  of 
cholera  epidemic,  380. 

Napoleon  I.,  street  reforms  of  Paris,  8; 
administration  of  Paris,  14 ;  police  pre- 
fecture, 35;  administrative  laws  of 
1800, 154-157 ;  relations  with  Spain,  241. 

Napoleon  III.,  street  reforms  of  Paris, 
8-11 ;  administration  of  Paris,  15 ;  ad- 
ministrative system,  158, 159. 

Nashville,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ger- 
man towns,  296. 

Neighborhood  administration  in  Vienna 
bezirken,  417. 

Neighborhood  life  centering  at  the  mai- 
ries  of  Paris,  33. 

Neuchatel,  proportional  representa- 
tion, x. 

Newark,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Fraukfort-on-the-Maiu,  295. 

New  Haven,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

New  Orleans  compared  to  Bordeaux, 
189;  growth  of,  compared  with  Dres- 
den, 294. 

Newspaper  kiosks  of  Paris,  77. 

New  York,  density  of  population,  83; 
transit  system,  85 ;  growth  of,  com- 
pared with  Berlin,  293 ;  street  paving 
compared  with  Berlin's,  298,  332 ;  com- 
pared with  Hamburg's  position  as  a 
city-state,  387. 

Nominations  for  Belgian  councils,  224. 

Normal  schools  in  France,  200. 

Nuremberg,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Providence,  296 ;  electoral  periods,  310 ; 
house  owners  in  city  council,  312 ;  paid 
and  unpaid  magistrates,  320 ;  gas-sup- 
ply, 347 ;  public  pawn-shop,  372;  parks 
and  open  spaces,  374. 

Nurses,  trained,  in  Paris  hospitals,  105. 

Octroi  system,  in  Paris,  141,  142 ;  in 
France,  204,  206-208;  abolished  in  Bel- 
gium, 230;  in  Italy,  256,  257. 

Officialism  in  German  city  government, 
322. 

Old-age  insurance  in  Germany,  369,  370. 

Omaha,  growth  of,  compared  with  va- 
rious German  cities,  295. 

Omnibus  company  of  Paris,  86. 

Omnibus  lines  of  Marseilles,  188. 

One-room  dwellings  in  various  German 
cities,  361,  362,  454 ;  in  Hamburg,  404 ; 
in  Belgian  towns,  229;  in  Berlin,  356, 
357,  361 ;  in  Vienna,  454 ;  in  Budapest, 
454. 

Opera,  royal,  of  Hungary,  465. 

Opera-house  of  Paris,  7. 

Oporto,  death-rate,  247. 

Ourcq  canal  (Paris  water  supply),  63. 

Palermo,  various  municipal  facts  and 
conditions,  286,  287. 

Pantheon,  new,  at  Budapest,  442. 

Paris,  see  chapter  I.,  pages  1-145;  as  a 
municipal  influence,  vi. ;  influence  on 
municipal  progress,  1,  2 ;  influence  on 
German  cities,  2 ;  street  system,  4  el 
seq. ;  boundaries  of,  1789,  5 ;  suburban 
development,  5 ;  population  in  1789  and 
1889. 6 ;  destruction  of  ancient  churches, 
6;  improvements  under  Louis  XIV., 


502 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


and  XV.,  7 ;  police  authority,  15;  muni- 
cipal council,  16  et  seq. ;  mayoralty 
question,  17  ;  relation  to  French  nation, 
22;  civil-service  organization,  27-32; 
arrondissements  as  social  centers,  32- 
35;  police  administration,  35-^45;  light- 
ing system,  gas  and  electricity,  45-54 ; 
street  paving  and  cleansing,  54-62 ;  wa- 
ter supply  and  sewers,  62-75;  sewers 
and  sewage-farms,  70-75;  privileges 
and  concessions  in  streets  and  parts, 
76 ;  parks  and  parkways,  77,  79 ;  transit 
system,  79-90;  area  and  population, 
81-84 ;  building  regulations,  90,  92 ;  san- 
itary administration,  90-96 ;  food-sup- 
ply, 97-102 ;  markets,  98,  99 ;  abattoirs, 
99,  100;  public  charity  work,  102-110; 
relations  to  labor,  111,  112;  mont-de- 
pie"te\  112-116;  savings-banks,  116-118; 
educational  system,  118-126 ;  fine-arts 
administration,  129-131 ;  municipal  fi- 
nances, 134-145 ;  cantons  of,  153 ;  birth- 
rate, 193;  death-rate  compared  with 
Marseilles,  193;  municipal  debt,  208; 
size  of  municipal  council,  310. 

Parks,  public,  of  Paris,  concessions  in, 
76 ;  system  of  Paris,  77,  79 ;  (and  light- 
ing) of  Paris,  yearly  cost,  141 ;  of  Milan, 
260,  261 ;  proposed,  in  Rome,  279 ;  man- 
agement of,  in  Stuttgart,  328 ;  and  open 
spaces  in  German  cities,  373,  374;  of 
Budapest,  447,  448. 

Party  politics  in  Belgium,  224. 

Paterson,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ger- 
man towns,  296. 

Paving  assessments  in  Paris,  55. 

Paving  materials  of  Paris,  56;  in  Mar- 
seilles, 192. 

Paving,  street,  in  Berlin  and  New  York, 
332;  in  Berlin,  334,  345;  in  Budapest, 
446 ;  in  Milan,  260,  262 ;  in  Paris,  55-58 ; 
in  Germany  and  America,  298 ;  in  Ham- 
burg, 401 ;  in  Hanover,  300. 

Pawnshops,  public,  of  Paris,  112-116 ;  of 
large  French  towns,  202,  203;  of  Bel- 
gium, 231 ;  of  German  cities,  372,  373. 

Penalties  for  refusal  to  take  office  in 
Germany,  318. 

Pensions,  retiring,  in  Paris  civil-service, 
32 ;  old-age,  in  Germany,  370. 

Permanence  of  organization  in  German 
cities,  331,  332. 

Philadelphia,  density  of  population,  84 ; 
growth  of,  compared  with  Berlin,  293. 

Philotechnique  association  in  Paris,  127. 

Play-grounds  in  Paris,  79;  in  German 
cities,  373,  374. 

Plural  voting  in  Belgium,  222. 

Pneumatic  tubes  (Paris)  in  sewers,  75, 76. 

Pittsburg,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Cologne,  294. 

Pius  IX.,  grant  of  charter  to  Rome,  273. 

Poor-relief.    See  Charity. 

Police  administration  of  Paris,  15,  35-45, 
140, 141. 

Police  authority  in  France,  37 ;  in  French 
towns,  181, 182;  in  Lyons,  182. 

Police  budgets  compulsory,  183. 

Police  control  in  Belgian  towns,  226;  in 
Dutch  towns,  239;  in  German  cities, 
321. 

Police  power  as  affected  by  bacteriol- 
ogy, 406,  407. 


Polytechnique  association  in  Paris,  127. 

Portugal,  health  conditions,  247. 

Postalsavings- banks  of  France,  203,  204. 

Poverty  and  the  community  in  Germany, 
330. 

Population  of  Amsterdam,  234;  of  Ant- 
werp, 228;  of  Arnhem,  234;  of  Barce- 
lona, 247,  248;  of  Bordeaux,  189;  of 
Budapest,  435,  462 ;  of  Bremen,  388 ;  of 
Brussels,  225,  229 ;  of  Florence,  269,  270 ; 
of  Gronengen,  234 ;  of  Haarlem,  234 ;  of 
Le  Havre,  196, 198 ;  of  the  Hague,  234 ; 
of  Hamburg,  383;  of  Liege,  229;  of 
Lille,  186;  of  Lubeck,  389;  of  Lyons, 
189;  of  Madrid,  247;  of  Marseilles, 
192;  of  Milan,  265;  of  Nantes,  196;  of 
Naples,  286 ;  of  Palermo,  286 ;  of  Paris, 
1789-1889,  6 ;  of  Paris,  1790  to  1891,  81 ; 
of  Rheirns,  196 ;  of  Rome,  277,  278 ;  of 
Rotterdam,  234;  of  Roubaix,  196,  198; 
of  Rouen,  196-198 ;  of  Toulouse,  196 ;  of 
Tourcoing,  198;  of  Turin,  268  ;of  Utrecht, 
234 ;  of  Venice,  287  ;  of  Vienna,  433. 

Population  of  Berlin  moving  from  center 
to  suburbs,  359. 

Population,  density  of,  in  Paris,  London, 
New  York,  Brooklyn,  Chicago,  Phila- 
delphia, Boston,  83,  84. 

Population,  growth  of,  in  Holland,  231- 
234. 

Population  of  various  American  and  Ger- 
man cities  compared,  293-297. 

Prague,  recent  development,  438;  num- 
ber of  rooms  per  family,  454. 

Prefect  of  the  Seine,  his  sphere,  23. 

Prefect  of  police,  Paris,  24. 

Prefects,  in  France,  154, 155. 

Primary  schools  of  Paris,  120. 

Privileges  in  Paris  streets  and  parks,  76. 

Property  owners  in  German  municipal 
councils,  312. 

Proportional  representation  in  Switzer- 
land, ix.,  x. 

Providence,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Nuremberg,  296 ;  government  com- 
pared with  Hamburg,  383. 

Provinces  of  Belgium,  215, 216 ;  of  France, 
147 ;  of  Holland,  237 ;  of  Italy,  253 ;  of 
Spain,  244. 

Provincial  towns  of  France,  186-209. 

Prud'hommes  of  Paris,  111,  112. 

Prussian  municipal  system,  305-307. 

Public  works  of  Florence,  270 ;  in  German 
cities,  331-336;  of  Paris,  organization, 
28 ;  loan  of  Rome,  278. 

Public  ownership  of  gas  works  not  fa- 
vored in  France,  50. 

Purification  of  sewage,  Paris,  72,  73 ;  see 
also  under  Sewers  and  Sewage. 

"  Quarters  "  of  Paris,  81. 
Quays  of  Berlin,  334;  of  Paris,  77;  of 
Rouen,  197 ;  of  Budapest,  444. 

Railroad  system  of  Hungary,  439. 

Railways  at  Berlin,  303. 

Railway  terminals,  accommodations  for, 

in  German  cities,  302,  303. 
Railways,  street.    See  Street-railways. 
Rapid  transit.    See  Street-railways. 
Refuse,  disposal  of,  in  Stuttgart,  328. 
Revenues  of  Paris,  141,  and  appendix  I. ; 

of  French  towns,  204,  208. 


INDEX 


603 


Bheims,  population,  196. 

Bichmond,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

Bing-strasse  of  Vienna,  420-423. 

Ring-streets  of  Budapest,  445. 

Eoads,  of  France,  183,  184,  185;  of  Ger- 
many, 298. 

Rochester,  growth  of,  compared  with 
Altona  and  Chemnitz,  295. 

Eome,  as  influenced  by  Paris,  1;  spirit 
of  modern  reforms,  7;  modernization 
of,  271-282. 

Botterdam,  death-rate,  233;  population, 
234  ;  water  supply,  235. 

Roubaix,  births  and  deaths,  195 ;  growth 
and  population,  196-198 ;  street  system, 
198 ;  an  industrial  town,  198 ;  municipal 
revenues,  207. 

Bouen,  births  and  deaths,  195 ;  popula- 
tion, 197,  198;  its  transformation,  197; 
municipal  revenues,  207 ;  municipal 
debt,  208. 

Eussia,  municipal  government,  x. 

St.  Etienne,  births  and  deaths,  195;   a 

modern  manufacturing  town,  198, 199 ; 

technical  schools,  201. 
St.  Germain,  Paris,  sewage-farm,  73. 
St.  Louis,   growth   of,   compared  with 

Leipsic,  293,  294. 
St.    Paul,    growth   of,   compared   with 

various  German  cities,  295. 
St.  Petersburg,  creation  of,  as  new  me- 
tropolis, x. ;  as  influenced  by  Paris,  l. 
Salaries,  of  Paris  councilors,  21 ;  not  paid 

to  French  mayors  or  councilors,  176; 

not  paid  to  German  councilors,  311 ;  in 

German  city  government,  320. 
San  Francisco,  growth  of,  compared  with 

Leipsic,  293,  294. 
Sanitary   administration  of   Budapest, 

451-455,  457. 

Sanitary  affairs  of  Milan,  264,  265. 
Sanitary  appointments  of  Hanover,  300. 
Sanitary  conditions  in  Holland,  232-235; 

in  Italy,  249, 250;  in  Marseilles,  191-193 ; 

in  Spanish  towns,  247. 
Sanitary  council  of  Paris,  92,  93. 
Sanitary  methods  in  general  of  German 

cities,  362-366. 
Sanitary  motive  in  German  municipal 

activity,  378. 

Sanitary  police  of  Paris,  94. 
Sanitary  progress  of  Belgium,  229, 230 ;  of 

French  towns,  191;  of  Genoa,  267;  of 

Turin,  269. 
Sanitary  reforms  of  Palermo,  286 ;   of 

Vienna,  430-432. 
Sanitary  services,  cost  of,  in  Eome,  274 ; 

organization  of,  in  Eome,  276. 
Sanitary  system,  new,  of  Italy,  257. 
Savings-banks,  municipal,  in  Paris,  116- 

118  ;    in  Paris  public  schools,  118  ;   in 

French  towns,  203,  204;    in  German 

cities,  371,  372 ;  postal,  in  French  towns, 

203,  204. 

Saxony,  electoral  system,  308-310. 
Scandinavian    municipal    government, 

viil.,ix. 

Schools,  see  also  Education. 
Schools  of  Budapest,  462?  463 ;  of  Belgium, 

231;     Schools,     Belgian,     obligatory 


courses  in,  218 ;  of  Paris.  118-126 ;  of 
Paris,  cost,  141. 

School  baths  in  Paris,  121. 

School-books,  free  in  France,  199. 

School  libraries  of  Paris,  128. 

School  restaurants  in  France,  199. 

School  savings-banks  in  Paris,  118. 

School  system  of  France,  199-201 ;  of  Hol- 
land, 240 ;  of  Milan,  265 ;  of  Spain,  246 ; 
of  Vienna,  432,  433. 

Science  of  municipal  life  in  Germany,  330. 

Scientific  methods  in  German  town  im- 
provements, 290. 

Scran  ton,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ger- 
man towns,  296. 

Second  Empire,  influence  on  municipal 
progress,  159. 

Senate  of  Hamburg,  385. 

Seville,  municipal  conditions,  248. 

Sewage-farms  of  Berlin,  336-340 ;  of  Bres- 
lau,  342 ;  of  Brunswick,  343 ;  of  Dant- 
zic,  344 ;  of  Paris,  72,  73. 

Sewage  purification  at  Frankfort-on- 
the-Main,  343. 

Sewers,  of  Berlin,  336-340;  of  Budapest, 
458 ;  of  Hamburg,  341,  391 ;  of  Lyons, 
191 ;  of  Marseilles,  192 ;  of  Milan,  261, 
262  ;  of  Naples,  283 ;  of  Paris,  62-75 ;  of 
Eome,  275 ;  of  Toulouse,  1% ;  of  Vienna, 
431. 

Shade  trees  on  Paris  avenues,  77. 

Sheffield,  births  and  deaths,  195. 

Ship-canal  of  Brussels,  228. 

Sindaco  (mayor)  of  Italian  towns,  253, 
256. 

Slums  of  Budapest,  454,  455;  of  German 
cities,  355 ;  of  Marseilles,  192 ;  of  Milan, 
265 ;  of  Naples,  284 ;  of  Paris,  90,  91 ;  of 
Toulouse,  1% ;  of  Venice,  287. 

Snow  removal  from  Paris  streets,  61,  62. 

Socialism  and  poor-relief,  370. 

Socialism,  municipal,  iu  Germany,  291 ; 
illustrated  by  experience  of  Stuttgart, 
324,  325 ;  involved  in  business  policy  of 
German  cities,  327,  328. 

Socialists  and  municipal  suffrage  in  Ger- 
many, 311. 

Socialists  in  municipal  politics  in  France, 
311. 

Sofia,  modernization  of,  xi. 

Spain's  municipal  system,  241-248;  in- 
fluenced by  French,  210. 

Specialists  in  Berlin  council,  312,  313. 

Sports  of  Paris  school-children,  124. 

Spree,  navigation  of,  at  Berlin,  304; 
quays,  etc.,  at  Berlin,  334. 

Springs  and  baths  of  Budapest,  465,  466. 

Sprinkling  streets,  in  German  cities,  346; 
in  Paris,  58,  60,  61. 

Statisticians,  municipal,  in  Germany, 
330,  331. 

Statistical  bureau  of  Paris,  133-135. 

Statistics,  municipal,  of  Budapest,  452- 
455 ;  of  Milan,  265 ;  of  Eome,  251. 

Stein's  municipal  reform  system  in  Prus- 
sia, 305,  306. 

Stettin,  growth  of,  compared  with  Amer- 
ican towns,  296 ;  gas-supply,  347. 

Stockholm,  growth,  population,  decline 
of  death-rate,  ix. 

Strassburg,  births  and  deaths,  195;  elec- 
toral periods,  309,  310 ;  size  of  munici- 
pal council,  310;  gas-supply,  348. 


504 


MUNICIPAL  GOVERNMENT  IN  EUROPE 


Street  franchises  in  France,  184. 

Street  cleaning  in  German  cities,  344-346 ; 
in  Hamburg,  401 ;  in  Marseilles,  192 ;  in 
Paris,  54-62 ;  see  also  Cleansing. 

Street  railways  of  Belgium,  228;  of  Ber- 
lin, 335;  of  Budapest,  459,  4<JO;  of  Bor- 
deaux, 189;  of  Florence,  270;  in  Ger- 
many, 350-355,  in  Holland,  235;  of 
Lille,  187;  of  Lyons,  188,  189;  of  Mar- 
seilles, 188  ;  of  Milan,  262,  263  ;  of  Paris, 
79-90;  of  Stuttgart,  325-327;  of  Vienna, 
427-429. 

Street  reforms  in  Rome,  277. 

Street  system  of  Amiens,  198;  of  Ant- 
werp, 227 ;  of  Berlin,  334;  of  Budapest;, 
443-447;  of  Brussels,  227;  of  Florence, 
269;  of  Genoa,  267;  of  Hamburg,  382; 
of  Liege,  226,  227;  of  Lille,  186;  of 
Lyons,  190;  of  Marseilles,  192;  of  Mil- 
an, 258-261 ;  of  Naples,  284 ;  of  Palermo, 
286 ;  of  Paris,  8-13 ;  of  Rome,  277,  278 ; 
of  Roubaix,  198;  of  Rouen,  197;  of  St. 
Etienne,  198 ;  of  Toulouse,  196 ;  of  Tu- 
rin, 268 ;  of  Vienna,  426,  427. 

Street-systems,  nature  of,  in  Germany, 
297,  298. 

Streets  of  Paris,  transformation  of,  4; 
concessions  in,  76;  shade  trees,  77; 
yearly  cost,  141 ;  cleansing,  64-62;  main- 
tenance, 54-62 ;  lighting,  45-54. 

Street-lighting  in  Paris,  45-54;  in  Ger- 
man cities,  346-350. 

Stuttgart,  influenced  by  Paris,  2 ;  births 
and  deaths,  195;  railway  terminals, 
303;  electoral  period,  310;  size  of  mu- 
nicipal council,  310;  paid  and  unpaid 
magistrates,  320;  electric  works,  323, 
324;  gas  supply,  324,  325,  348;  transit, 
water,  cleansing,  etc.,  325-329;  street 
cleaning,  345;  electric  lighting,  348; 
street-railways,  351 ;  parks  and  open 
spaces,  374. 

Suburban  development  of  Genoa,  267 ;  of 
Milan,  259-261;  of  Paris,  5;  regulated 
by  German  authorities,  302. 

Suburban  tendency  of  French  towns,  209 ; 
of  modern  cities,  297. 

Suburban  voters,  in  French  municipal 
elections,  169.  ' 

Suburbs,  annexation  of,  by  German  cit- 
ies, 301,  302. 

Suburbs  of  Paris,  rapid  growth,  82. 

Subdivisions  of  Vienna,  417. 

Sub-prefects  in  France,  155. 

Subways  in  Milan,  260,  261 ;  in  Paris,  53, 
75. 

Suffrage,  municipal,  in  Belgium,  216-222 ; 
in  Bremen,  388;  in  France,  169 ;  in  Ham- 
burg. 384;  in  Holland,  238;  in  Hungary, 
449;  in  Italy,  253,254;  in  Liibeck,  388; 
in  Prussia,  307,  308;  in  Spain,  243;  in 
Vienna,  413. 

Sunday  elections  in  France,  171. 

Suspension  of  French  mayors  and  coun- 
cils, 177, 178. 

Syracuse,  growth  of,  compared  with 
German  towns,  296. 

Swiss  municipal  government,  ix.,  x. 

Swiss  municipal  system  influenced  by 
French,  210. 

Tablets,  commemorative,  of  Paris,  132. 
Taxation,  municipal,  in  Germany,  876; 


'  in  Italy,  256, 257 ;  in  Paris,  143 ,  in  France, 
204-208. 

Tax-payers,  chief,  in  Hungarian  munici- 
pal councils,  450,  451. 

Tax-paying  restrictions  on  suffrage  in 
Belgium,  217,  221,  222 ;  see  also  suffrage 
for  restrictions  in  various  countries. 

Technical  education,  in  Budapest,  462, 
463;  in  France,  201;  in  German  cities, 
375 ;  in  Hanover,  299 ;  in  Lille,  187 ;  in 
Milan,  265 ;  in  Paris,  126,  127 ;  see  also 
Education  and  Schools. 

Telephone  wires  (Paris)  in  sewers,  75,  76. 

Tenement  houses  of  Berlin,  358-360;  of 
Budapest,  453 ;  of  Lyons,  190 ;  of  Tou- 
louse, 196 ;  of  Vienna,  453. 

Tenure,  of  elective  municipal  officers  in 
France,  160, 168 ;  of  German  burgomas- 
ters, 318, 319 ;  of  German  councilors,  309, 
310;  of  German  magistrates,  319;  of 
Vienna  councilors,  414 ;  see  also  Coun- 
cilors, Mayors,  etc. 

Terminals,  railway,  accommodations  for, 
in  German  cities,  302,  303. 

Theaters,  national  and  municipal,  at 
Budapest,  464,  465. 

Theater  tickets,  tax  on  in  Paris,  for  char- 
ity, 108. 

Thiers,  on  municipal  autonomy,  160. 

Three-class  electoral  system  in  Austria, 
414,  415 ;  in  Prussia,  307,  308. 

Toledo,  growth  of,  compared  with  Ger- 
man towns,  296. 

Toulouse,  births  and  deaths,  194 ;  popu- 
lation, 195, 196 ;  streets  and  boulevards, 
196 ;  overcrowding,  196. 

Tourcoing,  population  of,  198. 

Trade  schools,  municipal,  of  Paris,  126, 
127;  of  other  French  towns,  201;  see 
also  Technical  Education. 

Trade-unions  recognized  in  public  work 
of  Paris,  112. 

Tramways ;  see  Street-railways. 

Transit  systems ;  see  Street-railways. 

Trees  on  Paris  streets,  77. 

Trieste,  recent  development,  438;  num- 
ber of  rooms  per  family,  454. 

Tuileries  gardens  (Paris),  79. 

Turin,  growth,  population  and  various 
municipal  affairs,  266,  268, 269. 

Typhoid  fever  in  Paris,  102. 

Underground    railway    (proposed),    of 

Paris,  89,  90 ;  of  Budapest,  460. 
Utrecht,  population,  234. 

Vacation  trips  of  Paris  school-children, 
124. 

Valencia,  municipal  conditions,  248. 

Vannes  aqueduct,  Paris  waterworks,  66. 

Venice,  housing  conditions  and  sanitary 
reforms,  287. 

Vidangeurs  of  Paris,  74. 

Vienna.transformationof ;  chapter  VIII.; 
as  influenced  by  Paris,  1, 2 ;  size  of  mu- 
nicipal council,  310;  compared  with 
Chicago,  410-412 ;  charter  of  1850,  412, 
413 ;  municipal  organization,  414-417 ; 
old  fortifications,  418,  419 ;  new  streets 
and  public  architecture,  420-423 ;  build- 
ing activities  and  regulations,  424-427 ; 
street-railways,  428 ;  water  supply,  430 ; 
sanitary  reforms,  431 ;  schools  and  pub- 


•INDEX 


505 


lie  charity,  432,  433; -number  of  rooms 
per  family,  454. 

Virchow,  Professor,  in  Berlin  municipal 
government,  363. 

Washington,  plan  compared  with  Paris, 
10. 

Water  supplies,  filtration  of,  392-394. 

Water  supply  of  Amsterdam,  235 ;  of  Bar- 
celona, 248 ;  of  Berlin  334-336 ;  of  Bres- 
lau,  342 ;  of  Brunswick,  343 ;  of  Buda- 
pest, 452;  of  Frankf  ort-on-the-Main,  343; 
of  Glasgow,  68;  of  Hamburg,  68,  340, 
341 ;  of  Hanover,  300 ;  of  Lyons,  191 ;  of 
Madrid,  248 ;  of  Milan,  263 ;  of  Munich, 
342 ;  of  Naples,  283 ;  of  Palermo,  286 ; 
of  Paris,  62-70;  of  Rome,  275,  276;  of 
Rotterdam,  235;  of  Stuttgart,  328;  of 
Toulouse,  196 ;  of  Venice,  287 ;  of  Vien- 
na, 430. 

Waterways  utilized  by  German  cities, 
303,304. 


Waterworks ;  see  Water  Supply. 

Wells,   artesian,  in   Budapest,  452;    in 

Milan,  263 ;  in  Hamburg,  399. 
Wells  closed,  in  Munich,  342 ;  in  Rome, 

275. 

"  Wethouders  "  in  Dutch  towns,  239. 
Wines,  adulteration  in  Paris,  101. 
Wires  in  Paris  sewers,  75. 
Women,  municipal  lodging-house  for,  in 

Paris,  109. 
Wood  paving,  iu  Paris,  56-58 ;  in  Milan, 

260 ;  see  also  under  Fating  and  Streets. 
Worcester,  growth   of,  compared  with 

Germaii  towns,  296. 
Workingmeu's  cars  on  Vienna  street  rail- 

'ways,  429. 
Workingmen's  insurance   in  Germany, 

369,  370. 
Wiirtemberg,  electoral  system,  308-310. 

Zelle,  Dr.,  as  mayor  of  Berlin,  318. 
Zone-tariff  system  of  Hungary,  461,  462. 


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